MPs have reacted angrily to US criticism of the performance of Dutch and other Nato troops in Afghanistan and on Thursday called on US defence secretary Robert Gates to personally take back his words.

Gates said in an interview with the Los Angelese Times earlier this week that Nato forces currently deployed in southern Afghanistan do not know how to combat a guerrilla insurgency and that this could be contributing to the rising violence in the fight against the Taliban.
Officials later claimed Gates had been misquoted. ‘An apology would not be out of place,’ Labour MP Martijn van Dam told news agency ANP.