Afghan minister appeals for funds

Afghanistan's interim finance minister, Hedayat Amin-Arsala, has appealed to international donors for more money to pay the salaries of doctors, teachers and civil servants.

Mr Amin-Arsala -- who is attending the annual meeting of the Asian Development Bank in China -- said Afghanistan would be able to finance only about a fifth of its $460m annual budget.

He said donations from multilateral organisations, Pakistan and China would bridge the gap until July.

However, in the longer term, help to meet the country's operational costs was critical. Donors pledged £4.5bn for Afghanistan at a conference in Tokyo in February; however, correspondents say much of that money is earmarked for reconstruction projects, and will anyway be spread over several years.

From the newsroom of the BBC World Service