Cameron was forced today to scrap a visit to an Afghan town he had held up as an example of improved security after a soldier went missing in the area.
British Prime Minister David Cameron was forced today to scrap a visit to an Afghan town he had held up as an example of improved security after a soldier went missing in the area.
International forces have launched a huge manhunt for the British soldier, who disappeared just hours before Cameron began a surprise visit to southern Helmand province to announce Britain would withdraw more of its 9,500 troops.
Cameron said he had cancelled a planned trip to the town of Lashkar Gah, where Britain is handing over control of security to Afghan forces, so British helicopters and ground forces could continue their hunt.
"I arrived here today and received the news about this very worrying incident of a British soldier going missing in central Helmand," he told reporters after he arrived on a Royal Air Force plane at the Camp Bastion base.
"I was just very clear that you've got something like that absolutely urgent taking place, where you want to concentrate all the assets and ability that you have to try and find this person and bring it to the right conclusion.
"Its just absolute common sense that the military should concentrate on the most important requirement of all which is to help and find this person rather than to bother flying me around."
Afghan police in the southern province of Helmand, where mostly American and British troops are fighting the Taliban insurgency, said the man had been kidnapped in the Gereshk area of Nahri Sarraj district.
The Taliban claimed that its fighters had kidnapped and killed a British soldier in Helmand, but there was no independent confirmation and the militia is known to routinely exaggerate its claims.
Lashkar Gah was one of seven initial handover areas in Afghanistan identified by foreign forces ahead of a full transfer of responsibility across the country and the withdrawal of all western combat troops by the end of 2014.
After years of Taliban violence Lashkar Gah was seen as the most unlikely candidate among those chosen for early transition.
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