Foreign Affairs Committee on Dec. 4th, 2007

[Paul Dewar, NDP, Ottawa Centre, ON]

Thank you, Mr. Chair.

[The Chair, Conservative, Kevin Sorenson]

I'll just remind the committee that we still have committee business, but Mr. Wilfert has allowed us to shave five minutes off his time.

Go ahead, Mr. Dewar.

[Paul Dewar, NDP, Ottawa Centre, ON]

Thank you, Mr. Chair.

Thank you, Your Excellency, for making yourself available to the committee today.

As was mentioned, it is helpful to hear your perspective, because we can read papers and we can watch television, but having a firsthand account from your perspective is most helpful.

I just want to be clear about my party and where we stand. We have said that we want to withdraw from the counter-insurgency mission in the south. Let me just confirm to you that this is not a position that requires us to withdraw from helping Afghanistan. I want to underline that, because there have been some concerns that we were simply suggesting that we extricate ourselves entirely from Afghanistan.

I should point out that in 1998-99, many of us--my party and other people involved in the social democratic movement--were actually trying to get the attention of the world when the Taliban were doing what we now know they did, and they didn't respond. I think it's a horrific situation that the world community only responded after it affected them directly. I certainly understand your concerns about not losing sight of that. In other words, if we see quelling and we say, “Oh, great, fine, everything's done”, and put a ribbon on it and go home....

So I get it. I understand it. That said, we heard from members of the Canadian development community last week, as well as from those who are looking towards other solutions in Afghanistan, and working with Afghans. The suggestion was that we're not quite getting the balance right.

I've noted that you've commented in the public domain on a similar concern, that right now the emphasis on the military vis-à-vis the development isn't quite in balance, and that we need to find a better balance. I have to say that I was a little surprised, to be polite about it, that when I asked officials from foreign affairs and CIDA if three D was dead, they said they don't use that term any more, they have one D, and it's all working well.

So I leave you to read the record on that.

In your opinion, what is out of balance? Do we need more diplomacy? Do we need more development? Or maybe we need more defence?

[H.E. Omar Samad]

Thank you.

First of all, thank you for expressing your support for Afghanistan. Having spent almost three years here, I know that, overwhelmingly, Canadians care about Afghanistan, and they are over time becoming much more informed about Afghanistan and the realities of Afghanistan. They want to do something, and they are doing it. I hear every day of Canadians across this vast country, on their own initiative, doing something to help an Afghan in Afghanistan, whether it's organizing dinners and collecting money for education in Afghanistan or collecting teddy bears. So many things are being done. I appreciate that very much.

I hope I have a chance sometime, maybe not in this context, but with members of your caucus and party, to have a more in-depth discussion as to why the counter-insurgency issue is--unfortunately is--a real issue that we have to deal with. When an insurgent, or whatever you want to call him, comes into our country or is given money and told that this will take him to heaven, for example, and he kills a school teacher or beheads a woman activist or attacks schoolchildren going to school, we have a problem. We have a problem that needs to be dealt with. They're not wearing uniforms like my soldiers or your soldiers. They're not abiding, or trying to abide to the extent we can, by all the international norms and regulations and laws that organize warfare. They're doing it, of course, outside our norms, and they're doing it in a ghastly manner and in an opportunistic manner.

[Paul Dewar, NDP, Ottawa Centre, ON]

But it is getting worse, as you mentioned.

[H.E. Omar Samad]

Well, do you know why it is getting worse? Because in 2003-04 we failed to fill the vacuum and failed to build on the achievements and accomplishments we had, and they came back. That doesn't mean that now we have to accept it, but they used that opportunity to come back to Kandahar.

If it were not for your soldiers and ours, and the soldiers of other countries, Kandahar in 2005-06 would have fallen. The fall of Kandahar means the fall of the south, the south means the fall of the west, and the west means the fall of the rest of Afghanistan. That's how history is played in Afghanistan, and they know it. That is why they targeted Kandahar.

Anyway, let me go back to the balance issue, and I hope, again, I have an opportunity someday to sit down and go into much more detail about this, if you're interested.

The balance, I think, is an issue that has to be evaluated by Canadians first. You are an advanced democracy. You have institutions that can go in and evaluate how you are doing and whether it is meeting your criteria.

As I said, you are one of the top donors. You're in the top six donors, and you are moving into the top four donors toward Afghanistan. That is a proud place for Canada to be, and I'm not talking about the military aspect. You have to be extremely proud, as tragic as it is, of the fact that your men and women are serving courageously and with professionalism. They are respected by the Afghans, and we all share in the grief that your people have whenever tragedy strikes.

As far as development is concerned, there are times when the problem is not how much money is being given; it's mostly how it's managed and implemented. We are now looking at new concepts, including, for example, how to empower Afghans even more so that they can make decisions about their priorities and needs without having some consultant from a third country who is contracted for three months to come and tell all of us how to spend millions of dollars.

We have learned many lessons over the past six years in terms of how to disburse funds towards development and reconstruction. One of the lessons is to go to the communities, go to the Afghans, engage the Afghans, engage the communities. Afghanicize the process, listen to them, get them involved. They will protect your money and they will protect the school you build.

Every project that has been implemented in such a manner has not been destroyed, because the locals in the communities have protected it. The Taliban and the terrorists have not been able or not dared to go into those communities to try to create problems for themselves.

[Paul Dewar, NDP, Ottawa Centre, ON]

I have one last quick question.

I just want to know, who is protecting those projects, the successful ones that you said have been—

[The Chair, Conservative, Kevin Sorenson]

A very quick answer, then. We're way over.

[H.E. Omar Samad]

The people themselves. Yes, of course there is some government presence. There is the international community presence. There is an NGO presence. Everybody is playing their role. But now it's coming from the grassroots.

[Paul Dewar, NDP, Ottawa Centre, ON]

Thank you.

[The Chair, Conservative, Kevin Sorenson]

Thank you.

We're certainly hoping, Mr. Ambassador, that you'd be willing to come back sometime. With one hour and being kind of rushed with some of the other presenters we've had just prior to you, our time is pretty well up.

I do want to give you a little bit of an indication as to one of the questions we may be interested in when you do come back. I know you made some remarks just recently in Montreal at the Millennium Summit. You stated this:

Let’s also not forget that we started this process from the ground up, at point zero, with twenty-five years of lost opportunities behind us. And to expect that this gigantic job of putting a failed state back on its feet can be accomplished within a few short years flies in the face of reality.

That is very similar to what you said today.

I think probably one of the questions that the committee would be wondering about, and that maybe you spoke on a little bit today, is at what point can Canadians expect that Afghanistan will be able to sustain itself, perhaps without military intervention but continued developmental assistance? What timeline would you expect within which we could see a withdrawal of some of the massive international assistance we have?

But that's for another day.

[H.E. Omar Samad]

I look forward to that.

[The Chair, Conservative, Kevin Sorenson]

There are other committees that have given witnesses an indication of what the questions may be, so we will do that today with you.

[H.E. Omar Samad]

Thank you for the tip.

[The Chair, Conservative, Kevin Sorenson]

We thank you for being here today.

[H.E. Omar Samad]

You're welcome. Thank you very much.

[The Chair, Conservative, Kevin Sorenson]

We are going to take a very quick little break and then we're going to do some committee business. Mr. Wilfert has a motion that he wants dealt with today.

[The Chair, Conservative, Kevin Sorenson]

Committee, we'll come back to order. We have a number of motions.

The first motion that is on the paper is as follows:

That the Standing Committee on Foreign Affairs and International Trade invite the Hon. Maxime Bernier, Minister of Foreign Affairs and International Development, and the Hon. Helena Guergis, Minister of State for Foreign Affairs and International Trade, to appear before the Committee at the earliest opportunity to answer questions pertaining to the government' s efforts to obtain justice in the murders of Domenic and Nancy Ianeiro in Cancun, Mexico.

Mr. Wilfert, would you please speak to the motion.

[Bryon Wilfert, Liberal, Richmond Hill, ON]

Mr. Speaker, could I move the order just slightly. The second one is not, I am sure, contentious at all, so I would move the second one.

The second one is simply to get officials here--no minister, just officials--to provide a comprehensive detailed briefing on the current strategy and involvement in the Horn of Africa, especially Somalia.

I don't see that as very contentious. I would move that.

[The Chair, Conservative, Kevin Sorenson]

We would have to have unanimous support in order to bump or to move up the order of precedence--unless it's yours.

[Bryon Wilfert, Liberal, Richmond Hill, ON]

It is mine.

[The Chair, Conservative, Kevin Sorenson]

Then we will just stand your other one down and we'll go to the second motion.

[Bryon Wilfert, Liberal, Richmond Hill, ON]

Can I move that?

[Deepak Obhrai, Conservative, Calgary East, AB]

We are being nice today.

[The Chair, Conservative, Kevin Sorenson]

Thank you, Mr. Obhrai.

The motion is as follows:

That pursuant to Standing Order 108(2) the Standing Committee on Foreign Affairs and International Development call on senior officials from the Department of Foreign Affairs and International Trade and the Canadian International Development Agency to provide the Committee with a comprehensive and detailed briefing on the Government’s current strategy and involvement in the Horn of Africa, specifically Somalia.

If you remember back to the previous Parliament, I think Mr. Roy Cullen had a motion very similar, and perhaps this is what this one came out of.

Mr. Wilfert, do you want to speak to it a bit?