Delays in creating a United Nations-mandated military force for Afghanistan are expected to lead to the interim administration being put in place without the level of protection which a week ago UN Security Council members thought was essential.

This became apparent as the UN circulated the draft of a document being negotiated by Afghan leaders in Bonn, which made clear that Mohammad Zahir Shah, Afghanistan's former king, had turned down the offer to chair a six-month UN-sponsored administration.

Zahir Shah will instead preside over a loya jirga, or council of elders, which will decide the shape of a subsequent UN-backed two-year transitional administration.

The Afghan leaders in Bonn are expected this week to decide the final composition of a 29-member interim government that the UN hopes will take control of Kabul from the victorious Northern Alliance in the next few weeks.

On the issue of multinational troops, western diplomats until recently insisted they would be imperative if the new authority were to survive. Now they say the force could not be established quickly enough to coincide with the start of the interim administration.

Nevertheless, the UN on Sunday appeared close to convincing several wary Afghan leaders from the Northern Alliance to accept such a force.

"Conscious that some time may be required for the new Afghan security forces to be fully constituted and fully functioning, the participants in the UN talks request the Security Council to consider authorising the early deployment to Afghanistan of a UN-mandated force," the first draft of the UN peace plan, obtained by the FT, says.

The apparent reversal by the UN on the issue of the military force comes amid increasing unease in Washington over the prospect of the UN force hampering the military campaign to oust Osama bin Laden's al-Qaeda network.

The initial absence of the troops, many of which will hail from Muslim countries, would leave the new Afghan administration dependent on an internal multi-ethnic force. "We may have to find an interim solution to make Kabul neutral for the new administration," one diplomat said.

The UN's peace plan contains one solution that may satisfy all the parties at the conference: putting all Afghanistan's armed forces under the command of the transitional administrations as soon as the plan is agreed.

However, there is still great uncertainty over whether faction leaders will support the UN plan.

Burhannuddin Rabbani, who reinstated himself as president after the Northern Alliance ousted the Taliban regime from Kabul last month, had agreed to cede his power and could be offered a position within the interim administration, said delegates. However, they remained sceptical about Mr Rabbani's intentions.

Mr Rabbani has been the biggest wild card in the negotiations in Bonn, opposing the UN process at nearly every step.

Diplomats said he appeared eventually to have been sidelined by the more moderate, younger generation of Northern Alliance leaders, including Abdullah Abdullah, the foreign minister, and Yunus Qanuni, the interior minister, both of whom will probably retain their positions in the interim government.

If agreed, the interim framework would include an executive, which would choose a 21-member commission to set up the loya jirga and lay the foundations of a Supreme Court.

In view of the refusal by Zahir Shah to chair the initial executive body, the strongest candidate for the position is Abdul Sattar Sirat, an Uzbek/Pashtun expatriate living in Saudi Arabia, who was justice minister during Zahir Shah's reign, which ended in 1973.

The UN will play a supporting role in the interim and transitional governments. The text of the peace plan, however, does give the organisation the last word on the establishment of the Loya Jirga, if Afghan leaders cannot agree.

Observers warned that even if the Afghan leaders were able to overcome their disagreement over who should make up the interim executive administration and agree to the UN document in Bonn, the peace accord would still face stern tests on the ground: Afghanistan has seen multiple peace accords unravel in its past 22 years of civil war.

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