The spokesman's perspective:

Continuing our new series of video commentary, NATO Spokesman James Appathurai gives his personal perspective on recent articles discussing NATO. He invites you to write in with your own comments and opinions, which could be featured in the next installment.

E-mail comments to: press@hq.nato.int

As the new commander of NATO forces in Afghanistan expressed fresh concern over rising activity by militants in Pakistan’s tribal areas, two powerful suicide bombs killed two people and wounded several others near the Pakistani border on Wednesday.

One car bombing occurred in the eastern Afghan province of Khost and demolished a government office, killing an official and wounding eight civilians visiting the building.

The new commander of NATO forces in Afghanistan says he is concerned about violence spilling into the country from Pakistan's tribal regions.

General David McKiernan told reporters in Kabul Wednesday he wants to stem the flow of militants into Afghanistan, and that he hopes to develop a close relationship with his Pakistani counterparts.

Russia on Friday condemned moves by Georgia to join NATO, saying they could lead to bloodshed in the former Soviet republic's breakaway areas of South Ossetia and Abkhazia.

"We reiterated our strong interest in seeing those conflicts resolved," Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov told reporters after talks between the Russian and Georgian leaders at an informal summit of leaders from the ex-Soviet Union.

President Dmitri A. Medvedev of Russia warned the Georgian president, Mikheil Saakashvili, on Friday that Georgia’s joining NATO would deepen the conflict between the former Soviet states.

The State Election Commission announced late Saturday it would nullify results from 193 polling stations after detecting fraud and other irregularities in the violence-marred parliamentary election last Sunday.

The voting was annulled on several grounds, including ballot stuffing, voter intimidation and violence.

Turkey is blocking a NATO plan to help launch and train a fledgling Kosovo security force, in the latest setback for troubled international efforts in the territory, diplomats said.

The European Union conceded last month that its separate plan to train Kosovo's police forces was months behind schedule because of a diplomatic logjam in the United Nations, where Russia has resisted Kosovo's February 17 secession from Serbia.

The June 4 editorial "Railroading Georgia" correctly criticized Russia's latest effort to bully its former Soviet satellite. Clearly, for the better part of 15 years, Russia has been interfering with Georgian sovereignty and supporting two regions in Georgia that have attempted to form de facto separatist regimes. Russia has used both its military might and energy-sector leverage to muscle its way back into hegemony over many of its former republics.

Your suggestion, however, that the Bush administration address Russia's unacceptable provocations by "pressing NATO to grant Georgia a membership action plan" was shortsighted. The present Georgian government bears primary responsibility for NATO's reluctance to grant such a plan.

The American and North Atlantic Treaty Organisation (NATO) troops should leave Afghanistan because they are responsible for creating unrest in the country, Afghan leaders said on Monday.

“The real factor behind the unending war and instability in Afghanistan is the presence of foreign troops. They must leave the country and let Afghans establish a government of their choice,” said Afghan representatives at a one-day seminar entitled, ‘The Afghan imbroglio: problems and the way to peace’. Former jihadi commanders, political leaders, religious scholars, intellectuals, tribal elders and those who have served in previous Afghan governments attended the seminar. A joint declaration released at the conclusion of the seminar demanded the foreign troops leave Afghanistan, and urged them to stop unwarranted search operations, which often resulted in the killing of civilians.

United States marines pushed the Taliban out of this village and the surrounding district in southern Helmand Province so quickly in recent weeks that they called the operation a “catastrophic success.”

Yet, NATO troops had conducted similar operations here in 2006 and 2007, and the Taliban had returned soon after they left. The marines, drawing on lessons from Iraq, say they know what to do to keep the Taliban at bay if they are given the time.