NATO military planners recommended the "temporary" solution to avoid a new delay in launching the training centre at Al-Rustimayah in the suburbs of the Iraq capital.

NATO leaders agreed last June to set up a mission to train senior Iraqi officers, and began deploying military instructors last September. But so far they have been confined to the heavily-fortified central Green Zone due to security concerns.

So far more than 500 Iraqi officers have received training there, but the military alliance has made it clear all along that it plans to expand its training mission to Al-Rustimayah.

The decision to hire a private company to protect the training academy and its staff was agreed by NATO ambassadors on Wednesday evening, allowing the US-led coalition to contract out the work.

"This a temporary solution, until the end of the year," to allow NATO to assess the needs and deploy a NATO-led contingent, said the NATO official, requesting anonymity.

NATO aims to train some 1,000 Iraqi officers per year. A number of the 26-member alliance's members, notably France and Germany, are supporting the mission although refusing to send troops onto Iraqi soil.

The US-led alliance was plunged into one of the worst crises in its history by the 2003 Iraq war, opposing anti-war countries like France and Germany against Washington and its allies including Britain.

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