Foreign Affairs Committee on April 25th, 2007

[Gordon O'Connor, Conservative, Carleton—Mississippi Mills, ON]

Regarding the two agreements, the basic agreement with the Afghan government and the agreement with the human rights commission, I discussed them with the ministers for ISAF Regional Command South, who met in Quebec City a few weeks ago. The British and the Dutch have very similar agreements; I think maybe word for word they're just about the same.

[Francine Lalonde, Bloc, La Pointe-de-l'Île, QC]

Not at all.

[Gordon O'Connor, Conservative, Carleton—Mississippi Mills, ON]

I have to tell you that both of them said they liked our arrangement with the two documents we have, as we have more guarantees with our two documents than they have.

However, that being said, we have an agreement with the Afghan government and we have an agreement with the human rights commission, and we expect them to live by their agreements. That's why a number of our officials are involved now with the Afghan government and the human rights commission to confirm, for instance, the validity of recent allegations—which are media allegations—and if there is validity, what corrective actions will be taken. So that's going on.

But in addition to that, within the last few days, we basically have made an arrangement with the government in Kandahar province so that we can have access to our detainees. So, henceforth, our military—but it can be anybody—can have access to our detainees. But we want these agreements enforced. We want the Afghan government to live by their word; we want the human rights commission to live by their word. And contrary to what is said in the newspaper about the Afghan human rights commission, our people have been in constant contact with the human rights commission, and they have said to them that if there are any problems, if they need any help.... They said they had, in effect, some minor problems they would deal with themselves. They have never asked for our help.

We have been going back at them again in the last day or two to confirm the facts that have been put forth in the media, to find out if there's any truth to what you're saying, because we have a different story.

[Francine Lalonde, Bloc, La Pointe-de-l'Île, QC]

Mr. Minister, I asked you if you had read the document. Basically, your answer should have been no, because you have just told me that Canada's two documents and the Netherlands one are the same. But the Netherlands one is different in that it gives the right of full access to specific groups. It is written there “will have full access”. I read it in English to be sure that you understood. So you haven't read it.

How can it be more reassuring to hand over prisoners in accordance with the Geneva Convention if we cannot be assured that the conditions of the Geneva Convention will be fulfilled? We must not forget that soldiers can be prosecuted for not fulfilling their obligations under the Geneva Convention. This is not helping or supporting our troops.

Mr. Minister, I do not understand. You have just told us that you signed an agreement with the government in Kandahar that gives access...But why? Produce it for us, please. At the moment, I don't believe anything verbal. Why not put it right in the agreement? Listen to me, please. There are agreements like that, this is the time to make it clear.

If you don't want to resign, change, reassure us, please.

[The Chair, Conservative, Kevin Sorenson]

Thank you, Madame Lalonde. We have to give some time to the Minister; your time is up.

[Gordon O'Connor, Conservative, Carleton—Mississippi Mills, ON]

Madame, you can do your histrionics all you want. I only speak the truth, and I said that the U.K. agreement and the Netherlands agreement are virtually identical. I said they are virtually identical; I didn't say the Canadian one is identical. And I said that when they reviewed our agreement with the Afghan government and our agreement with the human rights commission—which, by the way is unique, as they don't have an agreement with the human rights commission to report back—they said the arrangement, in their opinion, was better and that they would like to have it.

[The Chair, Conservative, Kevin Sorenson]

Thank you.

We'll go to Mr. Obhrai.

May I also remind all committee members to address your questions through the chair. That way we can run a little better committee meeting, I believe.

Mr. Obhrai.

[Deepak Obhrai, Conservative, Calgary East, AB]

Thank you, Mr. Chair.

I'll be sharing my time with my colleague, Wajid Khan.

Thank you, Minister, for coming.

Our soldiers are dying on the battlefield. Therefore, Canada is at war. During the time of war, we need very strong leadership. I must say that you have provided that leadership to the country. We are very proud of your leadership.

During a recent television debate with a Liberal member, when I pointed out that it was during the Liberal regime that this agreement dealing with detainees was signed, he denied it. He said they were losing the election and they did not know anything about it. They had no idea about it.

I'm a little confused. I would like to know when this agreement was signed. How can the Liberals say they were absolutely ignorant of what was happening with this agreement that today they are making all this noise about? If such is the case, then there is incompetence on their part.

Minister, you talked about the compact, which is the main agreement we have with the international community, the UN and everybody. Perhaps if your office could provide the agreement to the members of the committee we could understand what the compact is and the milestones we have achieved.

[The Chair, Conservative, Kevin Sorenson]

Thank you, Mr. Obhrai.

We'll go to the minister and then back to Mr. Khan.

Mr. Minister.

[Gordon O'Connor, Conservative, Carleton—Mississippi Mills, ON]

The agreement signed by General Hillier was signed under the aegis of the previous government. I don't even think the election had occurred when that was signed. My understanding, but I'll have to confirm with General Hillier, was that there were inputs from different departments. For an agreement at that level to be signed, there would have been ministerial agreement. I'll ask General Hillier.

[The Chair, Conservative, Kevin Sorenson]

General Hillier.

[General R.J. Hillier, Chief of the Defence Staff, Department of National Defence]

In fact, sir, the agreement was signed in December 2005. I was in Afghanistan on a visit. Given the long time that we've worked together, I was requested by Minister Wardak, who was signing on behalf of the Afghanistan government, to sign on behalf of the Government of Canada. That was agreeable to the Department of National Defence and the Department of Foreign Affairs, which had worked together to develop the agreement. I signed it on behalf of the Government of Canada, with full knowledge of both those departments, in December 2005.

[The Chair, Conservative, Kevin Sorenson]

Mr. Khan, please.

[Wajid Khan, Conservative, Mississauga—Streetsville, ON]

Thank you very much, Mr. Chairman.

General, Minister, thank you for being here.

We've talked a lot about the Afghan business. I want to compliment the Canadian troops, who on several occasions have captured Taliban. Yet, they have not handed them over to the Afghan military who have threatened to kill them. They went nuts and said, “We warned them, now we want to shoot them.” The Canadian troops protected them, saved them, and turned them over to the appropriate authorities.

My questions, Minister, are about the 2A6 tanks. I saw your interview on television. Some of the opposition are saying this constitutes an escalation. Sir, is this part of our inventory? Is this escalation? What is the purpose of these tanks?

[Gordon O'Connor, Conservative, Carleton—Mississippi Mills, ON]

Our government is committed to rebuilding the armed forces--the army, navy, and the air force. With rebuilding, we're talking for the long term. You have to look 20 years or so into the future.

In the case of tanks, the army and the Chief of Defence Staff recently came to the conclusion that we require main battle tanks into the long future. If future governments commit the military to insurgencies of the nature of Afghanistan, we're going to need, among other things--we also need LAVs and everything else--battle tanks to provide protection for our troops and to deal with certain tactical situations where it requires heavy fire power.

We had two challenges. We had an immediate technical problem we had to overcome in Afghanistan. That's why we're leasing 20 tanks for Afghanistan. They will be there in a few months. But the tank purchase isn't, per se, for Afghanistan. It's for the long term for the armed forces. It's like replacing the CF-18; it's not necessarily for some operation offshore.

[Wajid Khan, Conservative, Mississauga—Streetsville, ON]

Thank you, Minister.

Secondly, what is NATO doing to map out the Taliban activity in the area? Keeping security considerations in mind, could you answer that?

[Gordon O'Connor, Conservative, Carleton—Mississippi Mills, ON]

As you know, NATO is the agent basically of the UN in Afghanistan and they maintain a number of headquarters that maintain an intelligence network--human intelligence and communications intelligence. They try to build up pictures of what the Taliban are doing. What they try to do is get ahead of the Taliban so if they have some awareness or indication that the Taliban are going to attack in some area, they try to move into that area first. That's why in the so-called spring offensive NATO moved into Helmand province to try to deal with the challenge of the Taliban in Helmand province. NATO is trying to stay ahead of the Taliban activities.

[Wajid Khan, Conservative, Mississauga—Streetsville, ON]

After the operation in Qatar, was there any development following right after the military operation? I was told by General McNeill, the ISAF commander, that the Canadians did some development right after the operation. He was very complimentary of that. Could you shed some light on that, sir?

[Gordon O'Connor, Conservative, Carleton—Mississippi Mills, ON]

When the Canadians moved into the Panjwai and Zhari districts, immediately behind them came the PRT with aid--immediately distributing to people blankets, food, and that kind of stuff, and then coming later with projects to develop roads, bridges, houses, schools, or whatever.

Our main thrust in Kandahar province is development. We want development to take place, because if development is successful, the support for the Taliban will fade away and the security problem will decrease. Our security forces are there to try to make sure that not only our development goes ahead, but the development of the Afghan government, the UN, and NATO.

Yes, our forces, once they go through a military operation, follow up with aid programs.

[The Chair, Conservative, Kevin Sorenson]

Thank you, Mr. Minister.

We have some more time. We'll go to Mr. Goldring for a quick question, please.

[Peter Goldring, Conservative, Edmonton East, AB]

Thank you very much.

Mr. Minister, I too want to congratulate your and the military's efforts. I think one of the proofs of how well things are going is not only the good reports that are coming through and the advancements seen at the community level, with schools and other infrastructure, but also comments from those in the military who have retired, who have been there and have come back and still remain committed to it. I referred the other day to Colonel Pat Strogan. We had quite a discussion on it, because as we're studying the issue, we learn from him how they interact in the villages and the tribal areas.

The security is one aspect of it, but of course security without a social structure won't work, and neither will a social structure succeed unless you have the security for the environment of it. I'm very pleased to hear from retiring soldiers of the progress that is being made and the very optimism that is being exhibited by everybody who has been close and involved.

One of the concerns I have is that a recent witness who appeared here, a professor from RMC, exhibited pessimism. Is that not a concern in the military, to have your Royal Military College, which is teaching and training these soldiers, have an element of pessimism there? How can they project optimism in a climate like that? I find that hard to understand.

[The Chair, Conservative, Kevin Sorenson]

Thank you, Mr. Goldring.

Could we have a very quick answer either from Mr. Hillier or Mr. O'Connor?

[Gordon O'Connor, Conservative, Carleton—Mississippi Mills, ON]

In the world of academia, people have the right to express their opinion. If the gentleman was a pessimist, he's a pessimist. Overall the armed forces is very positive about Afghanistan. I think you'll find nearly 100% support for Afghanistan among the Canadian Forces.

[The Chair, Conservative, Kevin Sorenson]

Thank you very much.

Mr. Hillier, did you want to add to that?

[Gen R.J. Hillier]

No, sir.