The situation in Afghanistan, NATO reforms and missile defense will be the main focus of discussions during a two-day meeting of NATO defense ministers, due to open in Brussels later on Thursday.
Defense ministers of non-NATO member states will join discussions on Afghanistan.
The NATO-led International Security Assistance Force (ISAF) currently has some 130,000 troops in Afghanistan. U.S. President Barack Obama has pledged to send an additional 30,000 soldiers to the war-ravaged country in the first part of 2010 to defeat the Taliban and establish law and order. Other NATO members have said they will send 7,000 additional troops to Afghanistan.
The participants of the talks will also discuss the situation in Kosovo.
A total of 69 countries, including major Western powers, have recognized the independence of Serbia's ethnic-Albanian-dominated province, which was declared in February 2008.
The rest of the world, including Russia, China, India and several European Union countries, still considers Kosovo to be part of Serbia.
The Ukraine-NATO and Georgia-NATO commissions are expected to discuss relations between the two former Soviet republics at ministerial level.
Georgia, as well as Ukraine under former president Viktor Yushchenko, have sought NATO membership. However, Ukraine has recently dropped its bid to join the alliance. Last week, the country's parliament passed in the first reading a bill that stipulates Ukraine's status of non-alignment with international blocs.
The Ukrainian government has said it will continue developing cooperation with NATO.
BRUSSELS, June 10 (RIA Novosti)
