Thank you, Mr. Obhrai. I know you have a particular interest in this file, and you have ably assisted us in your capacity as parliamentary secretary and as a participant in this committee.
You're certainly right to point to the fact that this is very much a multinational effort. We have working inside Afghanistan currently, alongside Canada, in the UN capacity—that is, not under the NATO flag with the security provisions but on the UN capacity-building side—in excess of 60 countries, most of which were signatories of the Afghanistan Compact, which was signed in London in January of 2006.
This list of participating countries continues to grow. And as I mentioned in my opening remarks, we are constantly looking for ways to partner with a number of those countries and participants. A number of those countries have already expressed a willingness to take us up on that effort, to join us, potentially, at the provincial reconstruction site in Kandahar at Camp Nathan Smith.
The work there is what I would describe as the most important for us. It's where so much of the humanitarian aid work, projects, and the quarterbacking, if you will, of our capacity-building, our development, and our exercises that make a real and tangible difference in the lives of Afghan people is done.
On the total support that you have inquired about, the support, as I understand it, expressed by the delegations of the various countries that make up this UN mission is in excess of $10.5 billion. That is an impressive amount of money by any measure.
Canada, as I mentioned in my remarks as well, is among the top three donors in that country. We have committed now in excess of $1 billion over a 10-year span on the development side. We hope to see more fruits of our labours when we start to expand that security perimeter. That, in effect, gives the partners we will be working with, the aid workers themselves, and the diplomats the ability to go further afield to reach into the communities and the lives of more Afghan people to deliver the types of programs and actual physical assets and infrastructure I spoke of in my remarks.
All of this, to me, points to the fact that we are winning. We're winning every day, with every child who's educated, every school that's built, every physical piece of infrastructure that takes hold in that country, and every program that reaches out to people to improve their lives. That's winning. That's making a difference. That's building that country. That's preventing the return of the Taliban. All of those important contributions that are made by Canada and by our NATO and UN partners are proof that, yes, we are providing hope, leadership, and a brighter future for Afghanistan.