Opposition Backs U.N. Role for German Troops : Politics: Social Democrats’ vote brings party closer to a public mood that has shifted perceptibly to the right.

The main opposition Social Democrats concluded a two-day special party conference Tuesday by voting to back a constitutional change to allow German military forces to participate in “Blue Helmet” U.N. peacekeeping forces.

Although the party’s new position falls far short of Chancellor Helmut Kohl’s call for provisions that would permit broader deployment of German forces, for example in operations such as last year’s Gulf War, the move was considered significant.

Together with the party’s earlier, far more emotional decision to back a constitutional amendment limiting Germany’s unrestricted extension of political asylum to foreigners, it brings the Social Democrats more in line with the country’s mainstream public mood--a mood that has shifted perceptibly to the right in the past two years.

The conference is also seen as a strong endorsement of the party’s new, more moderate leadership, headed by Bjoern Engholm, Schleswig-Holstein minister-president.

Engholm, 52, who took over as chairman only 18 months ago, risked a serious party split over the asylum issue and threatened to quit if the conference failed to back his calls for constitutional change.

The results of the conference are likely to make the Social Democrats a more formidable opposition to Kohl’s floundering coalition government. More immediately, they could also break a prolonged political logjam that has blocked concerted moves to resolve the vital asylum issue.

“Our country needs a new beginning,” Johannes Rau, a former chancellor candidate and now minister-president of Germany’s largest state of North Rhine-Westphalia, told the conference’s closing session. “Our country needs new policies.”

Parliamentary leaders of the country’s four mainstream parties are scheduled to meet Thursday for what is likely to be the first of several meetings to discuss how to narrow remaining differences and find suitable wording for the necessary constitutional amendment. Kohl needs the Social Democrats’ support to attain the two-thirds parliamentary majority required to alter the constitution.

Rudolf Seiters, German interior minister, said Tuesday that the Social Democrats’ amendment proposal does not go far enough because it fails, for example, to permit immigration officers to turn asylum-seekers around at the border in certain instances.

Officials among Kohl’s conservative Christian Democrats say that, barring major hitches, the amendment could be passed by the end of the year.

Months of paralysis by all major parties on the asylum-seekers issue are seen here as one important factor that has fueled the wave of right-wing extremist violence against foreigners that has shaken Germany in recent months. Many of the attacks have been directed against refugees, mainly from southeastern Europe and the Third World. These foreigners have used Germany’s virtual open-door asylum policy in hopes of resettling in one of the world’s richest countries.

It was unclear if and when negotiations between the major parties might begin on the search for new constitutional wording governing the deployment of German military forces. Unlike the asylum-seekers crisis, the issue of German troop deployment has slipped from public attention as Germany becomes increasingly preoccupied with its domestic problems.