National Defence committee  That's more of an operational question, and for reasons of operational security I will decline to respond to your question, with the greatest of respect, sir. We just do not discuss that in this forum.

National Defence committee  Thank you for the question, sir. They're still located within the three locations I described: Kabul, Mazar-e-Sharif in the north, and Herat in the west. To give you an idea, I just highlighted two of the main or biggest ones, the Kabul military training centre and the consolidated fielding centre.

National Defence committee  I would say the ratio is quite favourable. I would honestly have to do an analysis and get back to you on what the actual breakdown is, but we can do that. But our presence there is not preponderantly doing desk jobs, or if those people are doing desk jobs, it's because they're mentoring an Afghan who has a desk job.

National Defence committee  Thanks very much for the question. When you were asking it, I was trying to remember some of my experiences on the language issue back when I was in Afghanistan. It's a very complex environment with respect to language, because you have major ethnic groups. You made mention of the Pashtuns.

National Defence committee  First of all, you have in the Afghan National Army probably one of the very few unifying institutions in the whole country. Think of Afghanistan in comparison to our own country. What is the unifying thing? In Afghanistan the national army has that position. It's also one of the most respected organizations within the country.

National Defence committee  Yes, absolutely.

National Defence committee  Absolutely. Broadly speaking, our training system is geared, as is the Afghan one, to producing the very best soldiers in all the breadth and depth of the competencies that we expect them to have. Those come in two forms: individual training and collective training. Individually, we make sure that the individual has those skills, that he can march, shoot, and communicate.

National Defence committee  I don't. I think you've raised some very good points. It's certainly a concern. All I can say from my perspective as a military officer is that your security forces are raised in response to the security situation you find yourselves in and the threat that exists to your state.

National Defence committee  Right. In terms of the command and control in theatre, Major-General Mike Day maintains command over the entire affair. Brigadier-General Lamarre is specifically focused on operations in Kandahar. And then the training mission is what it is in Kabul. We should link up afterwards, because I did some time in Zgon as well.

National Defence committee  It is, and it's one of the areas that we're carefully considering for two reasons. One is that there are always risks of banditry going through some of the back parts of that country. You'll also be aware of the flooding recently that's occurred there. Unfortunate as it is, for our purposes it hasn't affected our ability to transport what we had.

National Defence committee  Yes, absolutely.

National Defence committee  The process we follow is a very rigorous one to make sure we're in compliance with all applicable regulations and standards imposed by those responsible agencies in government that regulate that. So there is a tremendous amount of effort to prepare the vehicles as they come through to make sure they're thoroughly inspected, they're thoroughly cleaned, and they have been prepared for reception back here in Canada.

National Defence committee  Right. Honestly, I'd have to get back to you on CANCAP and the civilians, on anything to do with that.

National Defence committee  I can't comment with any authority on the status of women and programs that address those very serious questions you've raised. I would say that the status of women is of great concern to us all, and I will say that as a matter of their government policy in Afghanistan they're taking great steps towards reinforcing the role of women and their place in Afghan society.

National Defence committee  It started today in Kuwait, sir.