Mr. Speaker, it is not just us in this corner of the House that are saying that there is another path that should be pursued in Afghanistan.
Even President Karzai has said that we need to be pursuing a political solution and a peace process in Afghanistan. I am going to quote what he said on Radio Free Europe on September 29, 2007. He said:
We are ready to negotiate to bring peace [to] this country. Continuation of the war, explosions, and suicide attacks should be stopped in any way possible. There were some contacts with [Taliban] in the past. But there is no specific, clear-cut line of communication -- I mean, there is no official place for communication with the Taliban. I wish there were such a place.
That is the President of Afghanistan saying that he hoped that there could be a place created now in Afghanistan for that kind of process of talks, of negotiations with, of all people, of all organizations and of all groups, the Taliban, because he understands that it is important to the future of Afghanistan.
I think that there is a lesson that we can learn from his words. If he is the ally that we have heard he is, we should understand what he has said to us and take that very seriously. We intend to do that in this corner of the House. We intend to say that the path to peace is one that we should be pursuing, that we should be putting effort into, and we are going to continue to put that idea forward.