Senior members of the cabinet are set to begin a series of global visits to shore up international support for the war in Afghanistan.

The prime minister is set to fly out to Saudi Arabia as part of his on-going mission to bolster Middle East support for the coalition, where he will again stress the fighting against the Taliban is not a war against Islam.

The foreign secretary is in Poland before heading to Moscow for crucial talks with the Russian foreign minister about the coalition against the Taliban.

Speaking after talks in Luxembourg with EU colleagues before he travelled to Poland, Jack Straw insisted European support for the coalition against the Taliban remains strong despite concerns over civilian deaths."There was no difficulty today. Everyone supports the coalition against terrorism. We agreed that the European Union must work even more closely with the United States to secure a proper peaceful settlement in the Middle East," said the Foreign secretary."

Straw will meet with the Polish president and foreign minister to discuss EU enlargement and, inevitably, the current crisis in Afghanistan.

Straw will then fly to Moscow where the theme will be the increasingly warm relations between Britain and Russia, which have been strengthened following the events of September 11.

Co-operation between the two countries is now at an all-time high and Straw is expected to say that the Cold War is now firmly in the past. The relationship is "not about the balance of power but a balance of trust".

Geoff Hoon is in Washington to follow up the recent visits by the prime minister and Jack Straw. He is expected to meet key members of Colin Powell's team and Pentagon officials to discuss how Britain's ground troops will integrate with American forces fighting against the Taliban.

They are also expected to discuss how the two government's will co-ordinate the response to combat criticism that the coalition's mission is beginning to drift and lacks focus.

Clare Short will be in Paris for a high level meeting with UNESCO officials. Though the primary focus of her visit will be to give a speech about education initiatives, she is also expected to discuss the aid effort on the Pakistan border.