Thank you.
Canada has pledged and is delivering on providing Afghanistan $1.2-billion Canadian worth of development aid in a ten-year period. Afghanistan is the largest recipient of Canadian aid ever. We are very grateful for this, and we appreciate every dollar. I, as an Afghan, have said many times that I want every dollar of Canadian aid to go as far as it can in changing and improving the lives of Afghans, whether it's for children and women, whether it's for infrastructure, whether it's for governance or rule of law or human rights.
For example, yesterday, we were very happy to hear about the $80 million additional dollars pledged over four years for demining. A couple of months ago, education again became a priority for Canada. Canada is going to be a leader amongst nations in helping us create the new Afghan education system and build schools and train teachers.
These are real changes, real facts, which one may not see because of the way the changes are implemented over time. But they have made, and continue to make, a difference in the lives of the Afghan people.
This doesn't mean that everybody's happy and satisfied. This doesn't mean that the job is complete and finished. This doesn't mean that the needs of Afghanistan are met. This means that this job, as I mentioned in my remarks, is a long-term mission of rebuilding a country that was destroyed over 25 years. Just imagine any society, whether developed or semi-developed or under-developed, being hammered politically, militarily, economically for 25 years constantly. What would happen? Do you expect that to rebound over five years? It doesn't happen. It has never happened in history. Why do we have such expectations for Afghanistan?
The question is whether we have the political will to understand this and then to commit long term, not only to the military aspect of this mission but also on all the other fronts that exist.
As you said, the Afghanistan Compact is a blueprint, and one that we have signed on to, which means that we have to meet.... For example, yesterday, we announced to the world that we destroyed, under the Ottawa treaty, all the mines and explosives that have been stockpiled in Afghanistan over the last four years. We signed on to the Ottawa treaty in 2003. We had an obligation to destroy tens of thousands of mines that were collected and stockpiled, and we did. That was an Afghanistan Compact benchmark that was met.
So where do we stand? Does this mean it's the end of the mine problem in Afghanistan? No. We know for a fact that we have millions of mines still buried under Afghan land, and every day—every day—at least two Afghans, mostly children, lose a limb or lose life as a result of it. Every day.
So you see, this is one issue that Afghans have to face, and one issue that you, as our friends, are helping us resolve, amongst hundreds of issues that we have to face. That means you have to be patient with this issue. You have to have a long-term perspective. You have to send the right message, not only to the Afghans, not only to the foe, which is sitting there trying to undo everything we're trying to do, but also to your own people, who expect you to deliver with their tax money.
When I say we are grateful for Canada's help, I mean we are grateful for every dollar, every soldier who serves in Afghanistan. They will be remembered for eternity in our history. They are now part of our history, as we are part of yours.
So are we going to give up on this mission halfway? As we see, there is real potential for success, because you have the backing of the Afghan people. Why throw away a mission, or change mid-course the dynamics of the mission, while what we could be doing is strengthening it? We could look at ways to strengthen it to better accomplish the goals we all have together.