'Time running out' in Afghanistan

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The former Liberal Democrat leader's warning came as he blamed "internal Afghan politics" for his rejection last month for the post of UN envoy for Afghanistan by the country's president Hamid Karzai.

And Lord Ashdown claimed that he did not want the job when first asked by US Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice and Foreign Secretary David Miliband last October.

He questioned whether the international community was "losing the battle" and said that without a co-ordinated strategy it would "not be possible to turn it round".

In a newspaper article, Mr Miliband said Britain was in Afghanistan not just because of a "moral duty" but that it was in the UK's national interest. His comments follow a surprise visit to the country last week with Ms Rice.

And he said commitments from other Nato countries to increase troop levels had to be secured in the next few months.

US Defence Secretary Robert Gates has been reported as saying that if other countries did not contribute to the mission it could eventually "destroy" Nato. Mr Gates warned against a two-tiered alliance of those "who are willing to fight and those who are not".

Writing in The Sunday Telegraph, Mr Miliband said there was no military solution to Afghanistan and Britain's strategy had to combine fighting the Taliban with economic development and clean government.

He highlighted what he saw as successes in Afghanistan, that two thirds of of the people had access to healthcare, the economy had trebled and around 5.5 million Afghan children were in school, more than a third of them girls.

But Lord Ashdown told the Andrew Marr Show: "I think Afghanistan is a failed state, I don't think it is on the edge of it. The question is are we on the edge of losing this battle?"