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NATO's military mission in Afghanistan is being "undermined" by some alliance members' failure to provide adequate troops amid signs the Taliban are gaining strength, a report by Britain's Parliament has concluded.

The report published Wednesday by the House of Commons defence committee warned the entire campaign is at risk if NATO members continue to refuse to deploy additional soldiers and increase development aid.

The report also blames serious strategic mistakes such as corrupt police and growing civilian casualties.

Britain has complained its forces, along with Canadian, U.S. and Dutch soldiers, are the only ones from the 37,000-strong NATO force who are fighting the Taliban in the most violent areas.

Other NATO-contributing countries restrict the use of their forces to relatively peaceful areas in the north.

"We remain deeply concerned that the reluctance of some NATO countries to provide troops for the ISAF mission in Afghanistan is undermining NATO's credibility and also ISAF operations," the report said in reference to the 37-nation International Security Assistance Force.


"Moreover, civilian casualties undermine support for ISAF and the government of Afghanistan and fuel the insurgency, further endangering our troops."
Canadian troops praised

James Arbuthnot, the committee's chair, singled out the more than 2,000 Canadian troops participating in the mission for their "extraordinarily good" work, but said additional help is needed for their successes to take hold.

"There are too few countries who are providing support for this mission," Arbuthnot told CBC News on Wednesday in an interview from London.

"The British troops and the Canadian troops are working extremely well alongside each other, and we must not allow the sacrifices that they are making and the work they are doing to be frittered away by a failure to support them from other countries."

The bipartisan panel's report also criticized the lack of rapid progress of NATO's work to combat the opium trade in Afghanistan and said alliance is failing to inform ordinary Afghans of the mission's success stories, leaving civilians vulnerable to Taliban public relations efforts.

British Defence Secretary Des Browne called the report "balanced" and said he recognizes there are problems, but stressed the mission needs to continue and succeed.

"To allow this place to become a training ground for al-Qaeda or for any other terrorist as it was before, and to allow them not just to deliver their activities to Kabul or any other of parts of Afghanistan, but to the streets of our cities, is exactly the wrong thing to do," Browne said Wednesday.

Spain, Italy, Germany and France, all members of both the European Union and NATO, have refused to send additional troops to Afghanistan.