Mr. Speaker, I commend the member from the Liberal caucus who just spoke for acknowledging what it appears the Conservatives, with whom the Liberals have entered into an alliance around supporting the continuation of the counter-insurgency war, are not willing to admit.
The member for Scarborough—Guildwood has quite correctly acknowledged that what we are seeing in Kandahar is not an improvement in the security situation but in fact a deterioration. He spoke about the recent Oxfam report, to which my colleague referred a few moments ago, “Community peacebuilding in Afghanistan”, in which it is absolutely acknowledged that security is deteriorating.
Red Cross officials have echoed those concerns and have talked about how really serious it is that NATO-sponsored provincial reconstruction teams often are treated with suspicion by Afghans, who believe that the teams are being controlled by foreign soldiers and so on. The UN has acknowledged 34 aid workers killed in the previous six months, with 76 abducted and 100 convoys and facilities looted. The UN World Food Programme reported that in the month of October alone 30 of its vehicles had been attacked and looted at a cost of $750,000 in stolen aid, compared to just five such attacks in the previous 12 months.
Given that reality, how is it that the member and his colleagues feel comfortable and feel that it is a responsible thing to do to critically sign on to a continuation of that counter-insurgency mission in Kandahar instead of getting onto a solid path of building peace?