(Adds Steinmeier, background)

By Louis Charbonneau

BERLIN, Nov 15 (Reuters) - Germany's lower house of parliament voted overwhelmingly on Thursday to renew its option to participate in U.S. counter-terrorist operations in Afghanistan, despite widespread public opposition.

The Bundestag said there were 413 votes in favour, 145 against and 15 abstentions.

Although no German special forces have taken part in such activities for two years, opinion polls show the vast majority of Germans oppose staying on the list of potential participants.

For months left-wing lawmakers have called for an end to German involvement in Operation Enduring Freedom (OEF), the official name for the U.S. invasion of Afghanistan to topple its Taliban government after the attacks of Sept. 11, 2001.

Since then, OEF has been expanded to cover the broader fight against terrorism and not only special combat operations in Afghanistan, where NATO troops are struggling to pacify an increasingly resilient Taliban insurgency.

German Foreign Minister and designated Vice Chancellor Frank-Walter Steinmeier welcomed the decision to extend the mandate for another year. He said German troops would continue to focus on training Afghan police and soldiers.

Germany has some 3,000 troops in Afghanistan as part of the NATO-led peacekeeping operation that is separate from the OEF mandate, which allows the deployment of up to 100 special forces in Afghanistan and up to 1,400 to monitor the Horn of Africa and the Mediterranean sea.

German parliament approved a year-long extension of its NATO peacekeeping mandates in October.

The OEF decision will come as a relief to the United States. For months, U.S. officials have been meeting German officials and lawmakers to try to persuade them that Germany should not break ranks with its Western allies.

Washington had strong backing from Chancellor Angela Merkel, conservative Defence Minister Franz Josef Jung and Social Democrat (SPD) Foreign Minister Frank-Walter Steinmeier, all of whom campaigned for OEF. They called it vital for the stabilisation of Afghanistan.

"The persuasion work had an effect on many," Steinmeier told Germany's n-tv television. "I'm glad that we persuaded them ... that we cannot leave the people who pin their hopes on us and our presence there in the lurch."

Most parliamentarians from the SPD, Merkel's centre-left coalition partners, voted for renewal of the mandate but 42 voted against. Merkel's conservatives and the liberal Free Democrats, an opposition party, overwhelmingly supported it.

U.S. officials had said privately that failure to renew the mandate would have been a serious public relations blow for the fight against terrorism. After the vote, a U.S. official told Reuters that Washington was pleased with the Bundestag decision. (Editing by Charles Dick)

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