Foreign Affairs Committee on March 6th, 2008

[Peter Goldring, Conservative, Edmonton East, AB]

Thank you, witnesses, for appearing. I have just a few comments.

I think it's extremely difficult to compare the situation in Haiti with the situation in Afghanistan. I have concerns about the many comments to do with negotiating. I wonder what the Afghan women members of Parliament who were here on the Hill would think. What would they negotiate away in these negotiations? Their jobs, their lives, their children's lives, education, governance? Where do you start and stop? I believe that eventually there will be dialogue and consultation, but I believe you negotiate from a position of strength.

My major question to Ms. Banerjee would be this: do you not feel that the best way to buttress the country against the extremes of the Taliban when they return would be by building the governance capacity, building the institutional capacity, and educating the youth? Even if it takes a generation or two, these are all very important things that will require assistance until the country has the capacity to refuse to accept the extremes of the Taliban.

As you said, the more moderate members of the Taliban could possibly fit into this method of increased governance—and quite nicely. But it's a little premature to be having these discussions. You're going to be losing an awful lot of the characteristics that these members of Parliament expressed to us when they came to the Hill. I would think that we have much more work to do on the governance and capacity-building level. Maybe you can comment on how we can improve and bring that along more.

[Prof. Nipa Banerjee]

You're talking about how the capacity building could be done?

[Peter Goldring, Conservative, Edmonton East, AB]

Yes, I believe the Manley report had optimism. We are there and it would be too early.... Those women members of Parliament expressed their need for help. Looking at this positively, there are good initiatives that have been done by CIDA. We heard last week of the good work that is done in certain areas. What else can we do with respect to governance, capacity building, and long-term plans that would be effective even after the process is turned over to the Afghan people? Can we buttress the country against the return of the extremists?

[Prof. Nipa Banerjee]

To start with what the women parliamentarians were saying, I think women are concerned about negotiation with the Taliban because women suffered most during the Taliban regime. So they do not want that kind of negotiation. But what most people are talking about is not negotiating away everything. There is no way Mullah Omar is going to come and negotiate with Karzai or anybody else. So we are not talking about the hard core again and the return of a repressive Taliban regime.

[Peter Goldring, Conservative, Edmonton East, AB]

But what capacity building can we do to improve on that to help--

[Prof. Nipa Banerjee]

I mentioned in my presentation that we need human security. Right now, mothers are worried about sending their children to school because there is no security. It's not only security from the Taliban; there is no protection from the police force. The police are corrupt and the ministry of the interior is corrupt. Secondly, there is no justice system. There is no access to justice for anybody. There is no proper legal system.

These kinds of things need to be straightened out. It cannot be done overnight; everybody is saying that. That's why I say the army presence is necessary. It's not that the army presence should be taken out. The combat, if necessary, should continue, but that is not going to lead to a successful and permanent expulsion of the Taliban.

[Peter Goldring, Conservative, Edmonton East, AB]

Would you not say then that Canada should stay the course in the interim to help build this capacity? It's my understanding that more and more military now are being trained, with the idea of them operating more and more independently. There are always things to do to improve on the policing and bring more confidence. I believe Canada is doing quite a bit of work in that field too.

Things don't happen overnight, but there seems to be a lot of progression toward that. From what you're saying, it is too early to open negotiations for a return of the Taliban at this time.

[Prof. Nipa Banerjee]

I'm not saying that. The army presence can continue, but negotiations should start now.

Yes, Canada has made progress on the socio-economic side, but we have completely failed on the security reform side. The police are not working out. They are corrupt. We have invested funds in the justice system, but it is not working out. The ministry of the interior that is responsible for the police force is extremely corrupt. Counter-narcotic strategy has failed. None of these things have worked.

I'm not blaming anybody, but in this kind of complex situation things can fail. We should learn from the lessons and try to coordinate better. Canada is training the police force or the army its own way, the Germans are doing it a different way, the Italians are doing it a different way, and the U.S. is doing it a different way. The country is not going to gain that way.

Therefore I am saying that capacity building requires better coordination in the international community. Leadership and design must come from the Afghans, and then the international community should coordinate. Otherwise it is not going to work.

[Peggy Mason]

Can I say something on the women's rights aspect?

[The Chair, Conservative, Kevin Sorenson]

Probably not. I'm trying to keep everyone to seven minutes, so we will pick you up on a second round right after Mr. Dewar.

Mr. Dewar, please.

[Paul Dewar, NDP, Ottawa Centre, ON]

I'll cede to Ms. Mason on the point she was going to make. Then I'll ask a question.

[Peggy Mason]

Thank you very much.

I started out working on the Hill on issues on status of women many years ago, and I find it extremely problematic to suggest that we are protecting women's rights best by the failing approach we are taking now.

The most vocal woman parliamentarian on women's rights in Afghanistan, Malalai Joya, was thrown out of Parliament because she denounced members of Parliament and the Karzai government, including the former defence minister Dostan of the Northern Alliance, for their treatment of women.

Part of the entire problem with how we have approached Afghanistan is this demonization--one side is all good and the other side is all bad. Unfortunately, as Major-General Lewis MacKenzie said in a very different context about the war in Bosnia and Herzegovina, how do I choose between someone who has killed 10,000 and someone who has killed 5,000? There is too much blood to go around, so we have to get beyond that.

I would suggest that women's rights are not being advanced in Afghanistan in a situation where the security of everyone is deteriorating on a daily basis. That is not the way to protect women in Afghanistan.

Thank you.

[Paul Dewar, NDP, Ottawa Centre, ON]

Thank you for that.

I think it's important to note, and you touched on this, Ms. Mason, in your opening comments, that we are now faced in our Parliament with a motion that I think will continue the same strategy we've followed in the last couple of years for another number of years. The government says that will be it and then it will be fine, which from the testimony we've heard I think is folly. I don't think anyone could predict that. You know, “Give us to 2011, extend the war for a few more years, then we'll achieve our goals and we'll pull out. We promise.”

I think anyone who has viewed this conflict, no matter what side you're on, will note there's no way to predict the future and say it's going to be all done. That's been noted from some of the examples—Cyprus being one.

I'd like to start with you, Ms. Mason. You mentioned Manley's report in your opening comments. By the way, I agree with most of his observations, but not his conclusions. But if it's not the right direction, what direction should Canada be taking in the next couple of years? You said that the counter-insurgency approach has failed. I would like to hear what you believe should be the direction that Canada takes.

[Peggy Mason]

Thank you very much.

Of course in my opening comments I emphasized where I think Canada should be putting its weight, on trying to bring NATO along. I believe that if we take that lead, many countries in NATO, if not most, and possibly also the U.S., depending on how the election ultimately goes, will come around to the need for a really invigorated effort towards laying the foundation for an Afghan-led peace process.

I completely agree, when one talks about a UN envoy, one is talking about a third-party facilitator, an honest broker, who has the credibility and the trust that perhaps the parties themselves don't have. But to be successful, any peace process has to be owned by the participants.

On the point about the UN being part of the problem, no one can coordinate an effort to rebuild Afghanistan without a common vision. I think we all agree that's lacking. There isn't a common vision. There are very different views about the way forward. I believe the possibility of a common vision lies in getting behind a broad-based peace process.

In terms of Canada's military role, what disturbs me so much about the revised motion before the House is that it seems to fail in one of the strongest areas of the Manley report, and that is greater clarity about this mission. The revised resolution talks about training. We know from the Manley report that Manley, at least, thinks that training must include mentoring in combat. I can say a lot from the NATO training I do about how that's not necessary. I mean, obviously you can have that, but you don't have to.

The next subsection of the resolution says “providing security for reconstruction and development efforts”, but there's absolutely no clarity about how that security is going to be provided. Right now the counter-insurgency mission is justified on the basis that it's providing security. But it isn't providing security. In 2007, at least as many innocent Afghan civilians were killed by Afghan army and allied forces—that's us—as by the insurgents. That was because of the heavy reliance on aerial bombing in particular when the allied forces got into trouble.

Nonetheless, those that support the counter-insurgency mission say we are “providing security for reconstruction and development efforts”. To have a resolution that has that statement “providing security”, with no clarity as to how that's going to be done, delegates everything down to the military mission on the ground. These are political issues of the highest concern. They are not tactical-level questions.

I would ask what they mean by “providing security”. In my view, the Canadian military is in an impossible position. They can't provide security without ending the war, and they can't end the war by military means. That requires political intervention. In fact to suggest otherwise is to really hide behind the troops.

When I talk about a reorientation of the mission, I would like to see our focus on trying to get a real political process going, which all the NATO countries get behind. In the meantime, forces on the ground in the south would have to adopt a defensive posture—a purely and totally defensive posture—to hold ground so the Taliban doesn't take over, even more than they're taking over now, while negotiations get under way.

That's not easy. Hopefully we're ultimately looking at a new configuration of forces, much more Muslim-complexioned forces, for example, who might be willing to come in if a real peace process gets under way.

[The Chair, Conservative, Kevin Sorenson]

Thank you, Madam Mason.

We'll go back, on the second round, to Mr. Khan.

I'll remind you, Mr. Khan, question and answers, five minutes.

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

Thank you, Mr. Chair.

You never give me seven minutes. Next time I'll go in the first round.

Thank you very much.

I will talk a little bit about Pakistan before I go to Afghanistan. But before I do that, I want to read to you what an Afghan MP said who implored Canada to stay the course. She is an elected member.

Afghan parliamentarians implored Canadians not to abandon them as the House of Commons argued Wednesday over the timing of a vote on the future of the mission in the war-torn region. Fawzia Koofi, among six lower house Afghan MPs visiting Canada...said this:

“We need to provide security and justice to the people and we cannot do it alone,” said Koofi... "This message needs to be clearly given to your public."

Going back to Pakistan, it has been argued many times that we should put more pressure on Pakistan. They are not doing enough. Let me suggest, when you have deployed more than 100,000 troops and the total casualties are many more times the total NATO forces--you have 17 million Pashtuns on this side of the border, Pakistan's side, three and a half million on the Afghan side, four million to five million refugees during 1979 and 1989--I think somebody should be talking about.... And the insurgents have attacked Rawalpindi, the army base, and have killed soldiers there. They have attacked Sargodha, the air force base where I flew from. And just recently they attacked the naval facility at Lahore, across from Aitchison College. It is very important to understand a country of 160 million people, which is facing the Taliban and the al-Qaeda eyeball to eyeball. It is time to appreciate that and look at it from a prism of Pakistan and not Afghanistan.

Here we are spending billions of dollars building capacity in Afghanistan. I think we should also look at building similar capacities so they can fight the very people who are destabilizing Afghanistan while committing atrocities on women, children, and the whole country. I think a parallel approach needs to be looked at.

As far as the negotiations are concerned, Washington and Karzai began these negotiations, these talks, way back before we started talking about talking to these guys. They started this in 2002 and 2003. Since then, NATO continues to talk, since 2006. These talks are ongoing. The British have done it. Pakistan has done it. The Americans are doing it. Sometimes you get blamed for negotiations. All the British were blamed for negotiations in Helmand and for ruining the mission. Pakistan was blamed for negotiations in Waziristan.

I think we need to have a clear view of the reality of what is on the ground. All conflicts end in negotiation. But has that time for negotiation arrived? At what point must negotiations be held? Who should we be holding negotiations with? Please, give me their address and I'll go do the negotiation myself. It is amazing that I've heard from so many people, “Let's negotiate”. Tell me, with whom? Mr. Karzai has been begging for negotiations. And I agree that all Taliban are not terrorists. There are murderers in other groups, but where are they?

I think it is time to say that we, as a NATO.... Canada in particular has done such a fabulous job. CIDA has done such tremendous work there. You want to provide justice. Fine, we are training judges, teachers, and others. You want to provide developers? Yes, 19,200 community councils have been developed. Schools, teachers.... Yes, some of the schools have been damaged by the insurgents. Should we stop doing all that development?

I would argue, Mr. Chair, that success will come only when we have the new generation, the men, women, and children who are getting education, who are developing themselves, and who are getting some taste of democracy as have these women who have visited us in Canada. And this is what is going to change.

I think we need to manage our expectations. We should manage our timing. We expect to wave a wand and everything will be okay. It's not going to happen.

Yes, it is not a perfect mission. Is there effort being made? Absolutely. Have billions of dollars been invested? Yes. Is the life of people getting better? Absolutely. There are six million or seven million kids in school, and two million of them are girls. Is that development? I would say yes.

Economic development, the community development infrastructure, the Afghan National Army, all these things are commendable and need to be perhaps improved, and yes, we should look at how we can focus our development further. Our PRT teams have taken the ministers out in the field, enhancing and increasing the writ of the government.

Are my five minutes over, Mr. Chair?

[The Chair, Conservative, Kevin Sorenson]

A long time ago.

I will move to Mr. Bell, quickly.

[Don Bell, Liberal, North Vancouver, BC]

Thank you.

I've found the answer to Mr. Khan's question. It's illuminating, so thank you.

I've heard the statement that there's no military peace that is achievable in Afghanistan, that the only way you really will achieve it is by diplomacy and I guess negotiation. It has to be an Afghani peace; it can't be an imposed peace.

The focus I've heard has to be on reconstruction and development. I have not been to Afghanistan, but I've seen the pictures, both video and stills, that show it is one of the poorest countries in the world, and what we see in those military shots is what the country's really like. There's basically no infrastructure. There's a lack of electricity. There's a lack of water. The comment was made, however, that if the infrastructure were to be built up--which is the reconstruction--that if it is not Afghani infrastructure, if it is UN infrastructure, it would be attacked by the Taliban and destroyed.

I was trying to wonder what role Canada could play. Could we suddenly determine that we're going to provide water systems or we're going to provide electrical plants, but if we were to do that, would they be in fact eliminated?

Perhaps the colonel could respond.

[The Chair, Conservative, Kevin Sorenson]

Maybe we can ask Mr. Landry to get in on this first.

[LCol Rémi Landry]

The answer, Chair, is simple. That's what they are doing right now. They are empowering the people, and that's what we've been forgetting since the beginning. People are saying we are fighting a war, and I still think we are there for the Afghan people. So we have to work with them, and they are the ones who, when they are empowered, will make this country safe. That's why I've been making a comparison with Haiti, because in the five missions that I've seen in Haiti, the people were always forgotten. And that's exactly what's taking place here—we are forgetting the people.

Right now there's a project. The military are building a road, a hard road, and instead of using all kinds of machinery they are hiring the people with shovels and wheelbarrows to build the road. It will take probably six months to build, but then this road will belong to the people. They sat with the people and they asked them: “Where should we build the road? How should we do it?”

So that's what I'm saying. By sitting down with those small communities, because the Pashtun is not homogenous.... As a matter of fact, we'll find there are many types of tribes within the Pashtun. Each village has its own tribal leader. So we have to sit downwith them, we have to empower them, and empowering them and providing order, that's what I've said since the beginning. We have to provide order.

[Don Bell, Liberal, North Vancouver, BC]

I appreciate that, and the move would be to go from the search and destroy that we have right now, I would presume, to the defensive talk that Ms. Mason mentioned. But the question that I heard asked was, does that mean we just sit there while we're shot at? “Defensive” also means, I presume, defend and pursue. So if somebody shoots at you, you go after them. You just don't go out looking for them. You go out after them if they attack you. Is that reasonable?

[LCol Rémi Landry]

I was in Bosnia, under chapter 6, and I saw a village put to flames, with people in it, and UN members were around the village not being able even to use their weapons to protect those people. So what I'm saying is that either you are in a defensive position or you are advancing. You need the capability to be able to protect the people, and to be able to protect the people is not to wait until somebody fires at you. It's to be able to protect. You have to do things that eventually will provide this. It's no good to protect people if they are all dead.

So that's what they are doing right now, and again that's the reason I asked this question. Why are we there? Are we there to assist Afghanistan or are we there to fight the Taliban? Those are two totally different types of missions. Are we with Operation Enduring Freedom right now? Is it Enduring Freedom that tells us what to do? Or are we there to assist the Afghans? If we are there to assist the Afghans, well, it's totally a brand-new strategy. They're totally different tactics, but it still requires the power to be able to do the job you're supposed to be doing there, to protect them until they are able to provide their own order themselves.

[The Chair, Conservative, Kevin Sorenson]

Thank you.

You have 15 seconds.

[Don Bell, Liberal, North Vancouver, BC]

I don't know if these figures are right, but I heard that currently there are 40,000 Afghan military, and within three years there could be 70,000 trained. Is that realistic?

[LCol Rémi Landry]

It is.