British Prime Minister David Cameron said Friday he would like British troops to be out of Afghanistan in five years' time, reinforcing his desire to draw down forces in the country.
Asked if the country's 10,000-strong deployment would be back home by the time of the next general election — scheduled for 2015 — Cameron said: "I want that to happen, make no mistake about it."
"We can't be there for another five years, having been there for nine years already," he added in an interview with British broadcaster Sky News in Huntsville, where is attending his first G-8 summit since taking office last month.
Progress in Afghanistan is expected to be high on the agenda when Cameron meets with U.S. President Barack Obama on the sidelines of the G-20 summit in Toronto on Saturday. Britain is the second-largest provider of troops in Afghanistan behind the United States, and its ongoing involvement is hugely debated at home.
The G-20 includes the world's wealthiest industrial countries, plus major developing nations such as China, India and Brazil. The G-8 groups France, Germany, Italy, Japan, the United Kingdom, the United States, Canada and Russia.
On Afghanistan, Obama has set out a timetable under which the "surge" of U.S. troops ordered last year would lead to withdrawals from the middle of 2011. But Cameron hasn't previously put a clear timetable on a withdrawal of troops from Afghanistan.
His aides in Huntsville stressed that he was not setting a deadline or committing himself to a particular target.
"There is no change in strategy or policy," a Downing Street spokesman said, speaking on customary condition of anonymity. "This shows the prime minister's determination to make the existing strategy work."
Cameron added that Britain should have a "long-term relationship" with Afghanistan, including helping to train their troops and government workers.
The British leader said he expected it to be a "difficult summer" in Afghanistan, partly because of operations with American troops in Helmand province.
"But we are getting to a period where parts of Afghanistan can now be run by the Afghans themselves," he said. "That is a very exciting prospect for bringing our troops home."
