Transcript

One of the secrets of Canada's success in Afghanistan to date is that our engagement, our commitments, have tended to be relentlessly relevant to the agenda at hand. When we were pursuing the Bonn agenda, the international road map for re-establishing Afghan institutions and central authority in the country, the focus was clearly on Kabul. We had to recreate ministries where there were none, ensure that the country hosted the Loya Jirga to fashion a new constitution -- Canadians were central to that -- and ensure that the interim president, President Karzai, competed in an election that met international standards, which he obviously did with great gusto and great success. But again the International Security Assistance Force and the international community here centrally in Kabul played a strong supporting role.

With parliamentary elections taking place in September (2005), the Bonn agenda starts to look complete. The international community is going to remain engaged here under UN leadership, with NATO and so forth, for years to come. And my own view is that the ultimate test of our willingness to put Afghanistan on a new path toward stability and prosperity is about to happen now in the post-Bonn era, when we will be challenged to maintain commitments beyond an emergency period of intervention, beyond an immediate post-conflict period of intervention.