Secretary-General Anders Fogh Rasmussen said Monday that Uzbekistan, Kyrgyzstan and Kazakhstan had agreed to allow the reverse transport of alliance equipment.

Since NATO already has an agreement with Russia, the deal will allow it to ship back to Europe tens of thousands of vehicles, containers and other items through the overland route when the evacuation picks up pace later this year.

“These agreements will give us a range of new options and the robust and flexible transport network we need,” Fogh Rasmussen told reporters.

He said the new deals would make “the use of the Russian transit arrangements even more effective.”