Mr. Speaker, I will be sharing my time with the member for Davenport.
Our constituents expect a great deal from us, their elected representatives, when it comes to the practical implications of the debate we are engaging in today in this House.
Steps have been taken in recent days to meet those expectations, and we have legitimate cause to be pleased, because the decision to send our armed forces into a combat zone is certainly one of the most difficult decisions to make, and it must be made wisely and not for partisan, vote-seeking reasons.
What Canadians expect from their country and their government is an approach that is realistic as to our means and our influence, an approach that not only meets our commitments to our international partners, but is truly effective in the field.
In short, we must take action that is sensible, clear-headed, effective and focused primarily on helping the people of a country in disarray, with the sanction of the United Nations and under the authority of NATO.
The top priority of the Liberal team and its leader, the member for Saint-Laurent—Cartierville, is to ensure that the Afghan people are never abandoned. More than ever, we must provide the Afghan people with tangible evidence of our solidarity. To that end, the mission must be clarified, the mission must end and NATO must provide other military personnel, so that a rotation system can be put in place.
It is high time to change our approach, to make adjustments and clarifications, and that is why we in the official opposition are saying again today that we will act resolutely and in keeping with our values, our means and our interests.
Serious analysis of the situation in the field clearly showed that the nature of the mission in Afghanistan could no longer remain the same. We therefore felt it was important to demand that certain major conditions be met to justify our continued military presence in Kandahar until February 2011.
The first condition was that the Conservative government accept the idea that Canada's involvement in Afghanistan must extend beyond military action. The importance of development and diplomacy, which was missing from the government's initial motion, has now been added, to the satisfaction of our party, which had called for this in its own motion.
We also included the requirement that NATO formally guarantee the rotation of troops in Kandahar. Sharing responsibilities with our international partners is essential to the redeployment of our armed forces in order to allow them to maximize their contribution with respect to why Canadians agreed to our presence in Afghanistan in the first place.
I am talking about one of the primary intentions of our mission, which is training the Afghan armed forces and rebuilding the country on a solid and democratic foundation. To accomplish this, our country first has to inform NATO, without delay, that Canada's military presence in Kandahar will end on February 1, 2011, and that the withdrawal of our troops will formally begin effective that date and will be completed no later than July 1, 2011.
It is no longer a question of getting stuck in an endless conflict with no end date, which is what the Conservative Party is advocating. Informing NATO is merely the first step. Effective February 2009, in less than a year, Canada's mission will have to focus on tasks that are concrete and of the highest importance in terms of our real capacity to contribute to improving the situation on the ground.
First, we must ensure that adequate training is provided to the Afghan security forces, because Afghanistan has to take charge of its own security. As far as training is concerned, our country has real expertise and it is high time to put that expertise to use. Furthermore, it is just as important to ensure that reconstruction and development projects in Kandahar are completely safe for those working on them and for the end users.
Our armed forces are up to the task. It is just a matter of Canada making the commitment. Nonetheless, it is also crucial, from the outset, to state clearly and in no uncertain terms that our mission in Kandahar will end for good in February 2011.
Why that date? Because in January 2006, at the London conference on Afghanistan, the Canadian government signed the Afghanistan compact, which established benchmarks and a schedule until the end of 2010, for improving security, governance and the social and economic development of Afghanistan.
The Canadian government signed that agreement and we must respect that signature as part of our international obligations.
That is why the amendments put forward by the official opposition are a logical and consistent continuation of Canadian policy in Afghanistan.
As things stand now, there is no sign at all of the diplomatic and development aspects of the mission. It must be changed, therefore, to put the emphasis on stronger, more determined diplomatic initiatives and on a genuine rebalancing of our efforts in the direction of reconstruction and development.
Another thing that the Liberal Party made a priority was the need for real transparency. We are truly pleased, therefore, to see the Conservative government abandon its previous stance of visceral hostility toward the very idea of accountability to Canadians.
It was high time because Canadians want to know—and have every right to know—what the real state of our mission in Afghanistan is and how that mission is being conducted. The very purpose of the amendments put forward by the Liberal Party was to fill the serious gaps the government had left in this regard.
Even though Canada must play its part within NATO—and is doing so admirably thanks to our soldiers on this mission—it is not a great military power. What it has is a strong tradition of diplomacy and development.
In addition, we have managed to resolve once and for all the thorny issue of the transfers of Afghan detainees in view of the unacceptable circumstances in which this was occurring—circumstances that were undermining Canada’s credibility and moral authority. The government has changed its position on this issue as well and we can all be happy about that.
We Liberals believe that principles are important but we are not dogmatic or doctrinaire and know when to be flexible. We are proving this once again today through our open-minded attitude to the changes in the government motion.
Taking a constructive approach, we urged the government to seriously consider the ways in which the Liberal positions were compatible with its own, over and above purely partisan considerations.
As of today, there is reason to hope that the House will finally be able to develop a manifestly Canadian policy toward Afghanistan which will give us an effective role there that is consistent with the expectations of our fellow citizens.
We should continue, therefore, to take a positive, constructive approach so that the people of Afghanistan ultimately get as much out of our presence as possible and the international community is finally able to see the light at the end of the tunnel in an issue that is really of major concern.
Canada can and should play a full role and I am confident we have the ability to succeed.