Troops may stay in Afghanistan 20 years says commander

LONDON - The commander of British forces returning from Helmand, Afghanistan, said that his forces were having to make up for the time lost by the decision of the United States and Britain to invade Iraq instead of concentrating on post-Taleban Afghanistan.

"We could have carried on in 2002 in the same way we have gone about business now," said Brigadier Ed Butler. "Have the interim four years made a difference? I think realistically they have. It doesn't mean that we will not achieve what we set out to do ... I don't think we have slipped back ... we may have marked time."

He said that an international presence may be required there for 20 years, but he did not specify how long the British would have to remain.

His comments came as the United Nations Office on Drugs and Crime called for Western troops in Afghanistan to attack opium traders, saying the drugs situation there was "out of control". Opium cultivation rose by 59 per cent this year to an all-time record of 165,000ha. That leaves a country that is practically run by the West supplying 92 per cent of the world's opium.

- INDEPENDENT