Ghor's new Governor Sayed Armar Ramadi made the proposal during a meeting with visiting Lithuanian Minister of National Defense Rasa Juknevičienė.
"We have proposed to the PRT to hand over the base to us once you leave the province. But the decision on this issue will be made by Lithuania itself," the governor, appointed in August, told journalists following the meeting.
Local officials say Ghor Province's security forces don’t have a proper base for living and working.
General Taj Mohammad Jahid, leading 12,000 troops of Afghanistan's armed forces in the western region, thanked Lithuania for its help in training local forces which, he said, made tremendous progress.
The general underlined that Afghanis have experience in taking over military bases from the international coalition. In the middle of September, a battalion of over 500 troops of the Afghan National Army was deployed in Ghor Province.
"Such handover of military bases as part of the ongoing process of responsibility handover is taking place in the whole Afghanistan. We already have experience in taking over such bases in some other provinces. So we have plans and believe that it’s a good idea to take over the PRT base from Lithuania which built and equipped the base," General Taj Mohammad Jahid, commander of the 207th corps of the Afghan National Army, told BNS.
Minister Juknevičienė said the final decision regarding the base has not been made yet.
"We have received a request from the authorities of Ghor Province, saying that they would like to take over the base. But calculations are ongoing at the moment. Everything that we'll need and continue using for military needs we'll take with us. But there are certain things transportation of which will cost more than leaving them," the minister told BNS.
The 15th shift of the Lithuanian-led PRT, mainly consisting of troops from Grand Duchess Birutė Motorized Infantry Battalion, is currently deployed in Ghor Province. They will be replaced by the 16th shift in November, and the last 17th PRT shift will be sent to Ghor in May.
Representatives from Georgia, Japan, the United States, Poland, Finland, the Czech Republic, Ukraine, Croatia and Bulgaria currently serve and work with Lithuanian troops and civilians in the PRT base in Chaghcharan.
The PRT Civilian Element includes representatives of Lithuanian, Japanese and US. offices that represent the governments of their respective states and conduct development cooperation programs and projects.
As the process of responsibility handover in Afghanistan is gathering pace, Lithuania plans to withdraw from Afghanistan's Ghor Province by the end of 2013. The Lithuanian-led international PRT launched its activities in Ghor in 2005.
