Nato foreign ministers meeting in Brussels have endorsed a plan to expand the alliance\'s role in Afghanistan. It will involve deploying 6,000 more troops in the south of the country, a third of them expected to be British. Thursday\'s agreement is set to make Nato\'s Afghanistan mission its biggest ever operation outside Europe. The south and east have been the scene of intense violence which has this year left more than 1,400 dead, making it the deadliest year since 2001. BBC defence correspondent Rob Watson says that some member states have been worried about potential casualties among their troops, which has made reaching Thursday\'s agreement difficult. \"We have today agreed to move Nato\'s support for peace and security in Afghanistan to a new level,\" Nato foreign ministers said in a statement. The agreement provides for a new British-led Nato headquarters in Kabul. Our correspondent says that to ease the concerns of some member states, it is being stressed that the troops\' mission will be to promote peace and stability, and not to hunt down members of al-Qaeda and the Taleban. That will remain the job of the US-led operation Enduring Freedom. (BBC)