Britain's Prince Charles paid tribute to his country's forces in Afghanistan on a surprise tour yesterday in which he met local leaders, viewed reconstruction efforts and checked on the progress of the Afghan national army.
The two-day tour by the 61-year-old heir to the British throne focussed mainly on the insurgency-hit south, where foreign forces and Afghan soldiers are engaged in some of the toughest fighting of a war now in its ninth year.
Dressed in body armour over his army fatigues, Prince Charles travelled by helicopter to see at first hand progress in a major anti-insurgency campaign, Operation Mushtarak, designed to help bring the war to an end and foster development.
He earlier received a briefing on the overall picture of the war from the head of Nato and US forces in the country, General Stanley McChrystal.
Paying tribute to British troops at the close of a visit subject to a strict news blackout, Prince Charles spoke of the "ghastly" worry for families back home that he himself experienced when his son Harry served for a 10 week-stint in southern Afghanistan in 2008.
"For the families, I know when my youngest son was out here, as a parent you worry the whole time. Having said that, the families are the most wonderful support for their loved ones.... We're very lucky indeed to have so many families who have, for instance, two or three sons in the armed forces and go on for several generations. It makes me incredibly proud of what they do out here," he said.
The Prince laid a wreath of paper poppies and white carnations at a ceremony at Camp Bastion in Helmand Province; there have been 276 British troop deaths in Afghanistan since the start of operations in 2001.
He also visited the Afghan army's Camp Shorabak, where he inspected an honour guard and observed training in clearance of the country's all-pervasive land mines.
In the provincial capital Lashkar Gah, he sat crossed legged on a cushion at a meeting with local leaders including Governor Gulab Mangal, and met members of Britain's provincial reconstruction team, involved in improving justice, security and in efforts to replace poppy cultivation.
"People never understand enough I don't think the extraordinary role played by our armed forces, not just in purely military terms, but in all the other wonderful things they are doing - aid to the civil power, putting things back together again, starting water supplies, building schools," he told journalists at a briefing later. While in Afghanistan, Charles also met British and Commonwealth troops serving in Kabul, as well as leaders in fields including environmental conservation, media, civic developments, architectural and archaeological heritage preservation.
In Kabul on Wednesday, Prince Charles visited the Turquoise Mountain Foundation, of which he is co-patron with President Hamid Karzai.