Posted on 09/22/2006 10:01:30 AM PDT by GMMAC
Karzai thanks Canadians for support
Afghanistan president addresses Parliament
Meagan Fitzpatrick
CanWest News Service
Friday, September 22, 2006
OTTAWA — Afghanistan President Hamid Karzai thanked Canada for its contributions to rebuilding his country and asked for continued support in an address to Parliament on Friday.
Calling Canada a model for "all that is good," Karzai said he knew the timing of his visit was significant. "I know my visit comes at a time of sadness for a number of families across Canada who have lost loved ones in my country, Afghanistan. I also know it is at a time that millions in Canada are pondering your country's role in Afghanistan."
Prime Minister Stephen Harper (right) and Hamid
Karzai, President of Afghanistan, in the House of
Commons following an address to Parliament by
President Karzai on Parliament Hill in Ottawa Friday.
Photograph by : CP PHOTO/Jonathan Hayward
Hamid Karzai, President of the Islamic Republic of
Afghanistan inspects the troops on Parliament Hill.
Photograph by : Ottawa Citizen
Karzai said it is to those people, in addition to the members of Parliament, that he wished to address his speech. He also expressed his condolences to Canada’s fallen soldiers.
"If the greatness of life is measured in deeds done for others, then Canada's sons and daughters who have made the ultimate sacrifice in Afghanistan stand among the greatest of their generation," he said.
"They have sacrificed so that we in Afghanistan may have security and they have sacrificed to ensure the continued safety of their fellow Canadians from terrorism."
The sacrifice is worth it and Canadian efforts are making an enormous difference in the lives of Afghans, he told the joint session of Parliament.
Karzai said his people endured over two decades of pain and suffering beginning with the 1979 Soviet invasion. After helping the world fight communist forces, Afghanistan was abandoned, he said.
"Few cared about the dismal plight of the Afghan people and even fewer thought about the consequences of leaving a country so dangerously vulnerable to foreign extremists," he said, adding Afghanistan tried to warn the world of the terrorism that was brewing there but their pleas for attention were ignored.
"Perhaps by the standards of today's world we did not exist for we had nothing to sell to the world or nothing to buy from the world, so we did not matter …The tragedy of Sept. 11 showed in a terrible way the flaws of the arguments against helping Afghanistan. For one thing, it showed that, in fact, the cost of ignoring Afghanistan was far higher than the cost of helping it," he said.
Karzai outlined the progress made by his country in the last few years and said Afghanistan needs the continued support of Canada to stay on the path to success.
"Despite our phenomenal progress, our new democracy faces serious challenges and threats as well," he said. He pointed to the insurgents and poppy cultivation for opium as specific examples.
"If we do not destroy poppies in Afghanistan, poppies will destroy us," he said.
"We want to have a country as good as yours and a parliament as good as yours and we will not have that unless we destroy poppies."
Karzai thanked Prime Minister Stephen Harper for his "steadfast support" of the mission in Afghanistan and also thanked previous Liberal prime ministers Jean Chretien and Paul Martin for initially committing Canada to the mission.
He left the joint session of Parliament with this message: "In Afghanistan, you are not only serving the cause of security for the international community, and your country, you are also helping one of the most oppressed societies in the world and the little children that they have. Thank you."
Karzai arrived in Ottawa late Thursday and met privately with Harper in the evening.
On Friday morning, he was met on the front steps of Parliament by the prime minister and a military honour guard, before making his way inside to address the House of Commons.
Karzai's visit is viewed by some as an attempt to boost support for a controversial mission that has claimed 37 Canadian lives since 2002.
His visit follows Harper's address to the United Nations on Thursday in which he called Afghanistan the most important overseas engagement for Canada and a test for the strength of the UN.
Karzai also spoke to the UN, and similar to his speech in Ottawa, he outlined some of the many challenges facing his country.
Corruption is proving to be a problem for Karzai's government and a Canadian official who recently briefed journalists on Karzai's visit said diplomats are working with the Afghan government to ensure public servants hired for key positions can be trusted to do their jobs.
Karzai's country is also facing economic struggles. He has singled out the growing problem of poppy cultivation as the main impediment to his country's economic recovery.
The UN Office on Drugs and Crime reported this week that Afghanistan continues to produce opium at record levels, and will break the Taliban's 1999 record for opium production before it banned poppy farming.
Women's rights have also not made as much progress as people may believe. Last week, the Afghan independent human rights commission released its latest assessment of the near non-existent state of women's rights in Afghanistan, pointing to the widespread persecution of women by a legal system that should be protecting them and a troubling rise in "honour killings" — the murder of girls and women by their families because of their refusal to participate in arranged marriages or end what the families view as inappropriate relationships.
At a presentation at the University of Ottawa last week, Afghan MP Malalai Joya was highly critical of the state of women's rights and overall democratic reform.
She said warlords still control huge portions of the country.
© CanWest News Service 2006
PING!
Harper sure is taking the wind out of liberal anti-war sails.
Having Karzai come out and say that "if you ignore terrorists you will get 9/11's" should get some squaks out of leftist media.
I sure like the way that Karzai made a serious point of NOT meeting with that leftie Layton. Good move, President Karzai and thank you for that little slap-down.
I think Layton's "soming out" recently has really screwed his political future. He took the party further left than the green party, LoL! What an idiot.
"Coming out"
Layton is psychotic. Of course, not all Canadians are against his insanity. Go over here to http://www.canadaka.net to see some serious NDP craziness. If you'd register and Freep that site you'll also be doing Canada a favor - this site was cited by the CBC as having an effect on Harper's election this past year.
Karzai arrives, avoids NDP's Layton
Plus & worth a re-read, Christie Blatchford's
marvelous slapdown of Layton & the NDP:
Love the soldiers? Love the soldiering
Ha ha. canadaka.net - what bunch of sad losers they are. I am, of course, proudly banned from that site since 2004.
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