"While the Afghan detainee access and treatment issue has kept Canadian politicians and media very busy over the past two weeks, the people of Afghanistan continue to face a series of serious challenges on the security, economic-development and state-building fronts almost 5½ years following the ouster of the Taliban," Afghanistan's Ambassador to Canada, Omar Samad, writes today in an exclusive commentary for globeandmail.com on the current situation in Afghanistan

"As far as the detainee issue is concerned, the Afghans, having previously reached similar bilateral arrangements with some other nations, did not hesitate to update and upgrade the 2005 arrangement [a deal announced last week] to give further assurances to Canada that we are willing to work together to improve detainee conditions under the law, to provide direct access for monitoring and, more importantly, to continue with the important job of helping restore good governance practices and advance the cause of implementing rule of law in the country . . . "

But there are other bigger issues, he argues.

"The Afghan people dread their [the Taliban's] attempts at making a comeback. That would be the end of democracy, human rights, education for girls and rights for women, development and reconstruction.

Afghanistan's Ambassador to Canada Omar Samad

"By association with extremist and terrorist groups, it would also re-create a serious threat to security at the regional as well as global levels.

"We cannot allow that to happen . . .

"Afghanistan is still a fragile country in transition from war and devastation to peace and rebuilding. It faces numerous challenges, but its people are eager for change and the international community's commitment to work on this strategic mission in one of the world's poorest and most disadvantaged nations is one key factor for success."

Do you agree?

Ambassador Samad kindly agreed to come online today to take your questions on the role that Canada is playing in his war-torn country. Your questions and Ambassador Samad's answers appear at the bottom of this page.

Omar Samad took up his posting as Afghan Ambassador to Canada in September, 2004. Prior to his arrival to Canada, he was the spokesperson for the Ministry of Foreign Affairs in Afghanistan and Director General of the Information Division for three years.

Born in Kabul in 1961, he attended primary and secondary schools in Paris, London, and Kabul.

He left Afghanistan in 1979 following the Communist coup d'etat and settled in the United States where he was president of the Afghan Students Association and later the Afghan Youth Council in America.

Ambassador Samad earned a master's degree in international relations Tufts University in Massachusetts in 2006. He earned a B.A. in communications and international relations at the American University in Washington, D.C. in 1991. He studied computer science from 1980-82 at NOVA in Virginia.

Ambassador Samad worked in the field of information technology from 1981 to 2001, while pursuing a second career in media, initially with ABC News and later as a freelance television producer. In 1996, he launched Azadi Afghan Radio and ran the Afghanistan Information Center based in Virginia. As an international media commentator and analyst on Afghanistan, he covered the Bonn Conference on Afghanistan for CNN prior to his return to his homeland in late 2001.

Ambassador Samad represented Afghanistan at the 11th United Nations Conference on Climate Change in Montreal in 2005. He has been an official member of Afghan delegations to numerous international conferences, including the Afghanistan Reconstruction conferences in Tokyo (2002) and Berlin (2004), UN General Assembly sessions (2002, 2003), Non-aligned Movement and Organization of Islamic Countries summit meetings, and other specialized conferences on Afghanistan between 2002 and 2004. He represented the Afghan Foreign Ministry on the Tripartite Commission on security between the United States, Pakistan and Afghanistan.

Mr. Samad and is fluent in French and English in addition to Afghanistan's official languages.

Editor's Note: globeandmail.com editors will read and allow or reject each question/comment. Comments/questions may be edited for length or clarity. We will not publish questions/comments that include personal attacks on participants in these discussions, that make false or unsubstantiated allegations, that purport to quote people or reports where the purported quote or fact cannot be easily verified, or questions/comments that include vulgar language or libellous statements. Preference will be given to readers who submit questions/comments using their full name and home town, rather than a pseudonym.

Jim Sheppard, Executive Editor, globeandmail.com: Mr. Ambassador, thank you for taking the time to join us today and to answer questions from the readers of globeandmail.com. You wrote today in your commentary for globeandmail.com about the attention given over the past few weeks in Canada to the detainee issue vis-a-vis the fact that the people of Afghanistan "continue to face a series of serious challenges on the security, economic-development and state-building fronts almost 5½ years following the ouster of the Taliban." Our readers would probably be interested in hearing more from you on whether you think the attention focused on the detainee issue obscured these bigger issues, and complicated Canada's role in southern Afghanistan.

Ambassador Samad: I don't think the detainee issue complicated Canada's role in Kandahar or across Afghanistan, but it did shift attention away from other Afghan issues and priorities important to Canada, such as the development forum, the meeting in Anqara between [Afghan] President [Hamid] Karzai and [Pakistan President] Gen. [Pervez] Musharraf and the continuing attacks by Taliban on civilians and others. On the other hand, we hope that we now have an improved arrangement that will prevent more such allegations from disrupting other matters.

Courtney Rempel: Mr. Samad, what do you think is the single most important thing Canada should be doing to help Afghanistan? As a native of the country, what effect do you feel we've had on the Afghan people?

Ambassador Samad: Canada has had a strong engagement with its 3D (defence, diplomacy and development) approach since 2001. This has now been expanded into other areas, such as rule of law, governance and even police/corrections fields. We appreciate the fact the aid has doubled in the past year and there is more coordination on disbursements. I think that Canada's help in the area of security is strategically crucial. The operations in the south last year with Afghan forces prevented the collapse of Kandahar into Taliban hands. Can you imagine the impact if we had failed to act on time?

The other area that Canadian help can be of great value is to help us rebuild shattered institutions and build professional capacities through training. The support given to our rural development programs have been positive and I think that Canada should now focus on a few select and strategic projects (maybe infrastructure of some sort) that makes a difference in people's lives. We need to manage and disburse aid in a more effective manner.

David Howell, Saltspring, B.C.: Ambassador Samad, do you feel that the NATO forces in your country are engaged in winnable confrontation? Do you see a time in the future when the Afghani forces will be able to handle these problems on their own or with greatly reduced international support?

Ambassador Samad: Yes, the mission in Afghanistan is winnable. We seemed to be doing fine until a couple of years ago when we realized that we had taken the Taliban resurgence for granted. They had found a refuge across our borders, sources for money (mostly from drugs), training, recruitment, rearmament and use of new lethal methods to make a comeback. Meanwhile, we need to accelerate our collective efforts to train a professional and able National Army and police. We are almost half way down that path, but the quality of the training and quantity of assistance do matter. I think that a vital criteria for an exit-strategy has to do with the efforts underway to complete the formation of the army and police alongside the judiciary and other institutions so that NATO and others could contemplate a withdrawal.

Dick Ito, Abbotsford, B.C.: Ambassador Samad, could you please give me a sense of the numbers of active Taliban supporters in your country and also in the neighbouring country of Pakistan. Thank you.

Ambassador Samad: Very difficult to say. There are pockets of support and sympathy for various reasons mostly across southern and eastern Afghanistan, but not in large or significant numbers. Most of their active support comes from across the Durand Line frontier with Pakistan, where Taliban-style religious parties and militant groups have found support and refuge. Some are Pakistani and fewer are Afghan. Could not give you figures, but active Taliban inside Afghanistan are in the thousands.

T. Steets: Good morning Ambassador. As the Canadian public and opposition parties grow more and more skeptical of the mission because of the appearance of too much emphasis on the combat operations and too little growth on the realization of an independent and self-sustaining Afghanistan government, do you have suggestions for an area where the Canadian effort could be increased to raise the profile of operations which support the Afghanistan government? Thank you.

Ambassador Samad: Good afternoon. I believe that the security mission is critical and without our military efforts to keep the Taliban at bay and hopefully to bring them to the realization that militancy is not an option nor a solution, other work in other areas would be less effective. However, we do need to pay as much attention to state and nation building and reconstruction activities as we do to the stabilization work. We are working towards what you call creating a self-sustaining Afghan government. This year, we collected 500% more domestic revenues than we did four years ago. We spent 65% of our development budget on projects, whereas last year, the figure was less than 50%. So there is a lot of work being done in all areas, but we need to do more, and do it better to make a real difference in people's lives. Canadians can help us with a host of issues to raise the profile even more. For example, they could help with professional training, water management, alternative power. A lot of Canadian money is going towards micro finance, which is a successful endeavour.

Nick Wright, Halifax: Ambassador Samad: Thank you for taking our questions on a matter that is of grave importance to both our countries. From your perspective as a native Afghan who has also received a Western education, what value should NATO place on the traditional Afghan methods of working out territorial disputes as a path out of the current impasse? I say impasse because, realistically, the current NATO anti-insurgency mission in your country seems open-ended, unsustainable, and inadequate in many ways. In my reading, it seems the Afghans traditionally don't let open conflict go on too long among themselves, but seek face-saving compromises that accommodate the goals of both sides to the extent that they can co-exist. Perhaps the presence of foreign militaries is interfering with this option. Please comment.

Ambassador Samad: I don't think that the presence of foreign militaries generally is hampering efforts. However, we keep urging foreign forces to be respectful of Afghan traditions, Afghan civilian lives and not to start acting as colonialists. You are there at the invitation of the Afghans and under a UN mandate for clear reasons that have to do with the conditions in Afghanistan prior to 9/11 and after 9/11. We saw what happened when the world left Afghanistan after the Soviet pullout and did not engage in rebuilding efforts. We fell into the hands of fanatics and terrorists. We cannot allow that to happen again. We are using our Afghan traditional methods to find solution as well. We have agreed with Pakistan for example to allow for a jirga (assembly) of Afghan and Pakistani civil society and tribal leaders to assess the security situation, to seek ways to prevent extremists and militants to continue their campaign and to look at ways and means to promote better understanding. We do not think that Talibanization of either society would benefit any one or is a desire of our people. We need to struggle against this strand of radicalism and misplaced jihadi violence that has no room in mainstream Islam through any means possible, including dialogue, peace-building measures and other methods.

Sam M., Montreal: How many new schools, roads and hospitals have been built by NATO forces? All I've seen on video is one new road built for a re-supply route for NATO and a bunch of canvas tents being used for school rooms.

Ambassador Samad: The problem is not how many, the problem in southern Afghanistan (and in 4-5 provinces out of 34 provinces) is that the militant Taliban and their allies target schools, clinics, teachers, tribal elders, doctors and nurse and road workers as soon as we build or work on projects. This is what our people and your brave soldiers and others are facing every day. More than six million children (including 40% girls) are going to school today, whereas under the Taliban only 100,000 boys had access to primitive education. We have built hundreds of schools and clinics (with Canadian and other donor aid) across the country in the past five years. New roads are being built to connect commerce and people across the country, but it's not only sufficient to rebuild secondary roads. We need to do more and especially focus on power/electricity generation, water/irrigation, agriculture and finding solutions to the poppy problem. We also need to do more fighting corruption and weak capacities.

Brent Beach, Victoria, B.C.: The ambassador's commentary missed an important aspect of Afghanistan culture/society that some say stands in the way of democracy in that country -- the existence of armed militias under the control of warlords. Does the Afghan government understand the importance of limiting armed forces [and bringing them under] state control? What measures is the government taking to reach this goal?

Ambassador Samad: Thank you. We are an infant democracy and are taking baby steps to nurture what our people want in terms of the political system. We do not see (as other developing nation's experience has shown) a major contrast between our traditions and certain basic democratic values. We are building an Afghan democracy and it may fall and face challenges but will get up and move again. Armed groups and so-called warlords/druglords are an impediment. We have those who controlled armies and private militias who are now part of the process and support it. We also cannot instigate a civil war while the process is under attack from radicals and those affiliated with terrorism and drug mafias. So it's a delicate balance, but overall, with more than 60K militias demobilized and disarmed, more than 95% of heavy weapons collected and thousands of former combatants re-integrated, we seem to be heading in the right direction. We had a program called DDR to disarm, and now we have a program called DIAG to disarm small illegal armed factions. We hope to accelerate this process even further. It will take some time.

Geoffrey May from Canada writes: Can the Ambasador explain why, in a country with a long and noble military tradition, a country that ejected the might of the Soviet Union, why does Afghanistan still need foreign armies to protect its government?

Ambassador Samad: Great question. We could rearm and unleash the Afghans to fight. This would undermine our efforts to build up state institutions, like a professional army, police and so on. It would once again create warlords and private armies and strengthen the existing ones. It would recreate chaos and civil strife and bring back regional interests and players into Afghanistan in a destructive manner. We experienced all of that in the past 30 years. The Afghan bravely fought the Soviets in the 80s and then again, under different circumstances, when the world had forgotten us, we still continued to bravely fight the Taliban and Al-Qaeda in the 90s. The leader of the resistance, Ahmad Shah Massoud, was assassinated by Al-Qaeda on Sept. 9, 2001, two days prior to 9/11. Over 30 years the Afghans have tired and are looking for peace, stability and reconstruction. They know that without international support, we may not find the political and social stability necessary to rebuild the country. We need to focus on other priorities today. Increasingly, the Afghans themselves are taking charge of their security. Meanwhile, the hunt for Al-Qaeda and Taliban leaders continues because they pose a threat not only to the Afghans, but also to the rest of you.

Pascal Zamprelli from Montreal writes: I consider Canada's role in Afghanistan to be crucial, in that it is vital to the international community's stated goal of stabilizing and developing the country, thus avoiding another power vacuum. Without more involvement from other countries, however, people here are unlikely to be supportive, feeling that Canada can't accomplish the broad mission (defence, development, diplomacy) on its own. How do we engage those other nations and make this a truly international effort?

Ambassador Samad: Thank you. There are currently about 40 nations with military and security commitments to Afghanistan. There are more than 70 nations and international organizations (like the UN and the IFIs) with other types of commitments to rebuild the country. According to the Afghanistan Compact of 2006, this developmental engagement will continue until 2011. We are grateful for all countries who are engaged in Afghanistan to help us with stability and reconstruction. We believe that within NATO, member states can find ways to address the issue of combat v. non-combat roles. That is an internal issue. In the international community, we would like to see a greater role by Islamic nations (whose attention is diverted by other priorities) in the rebuilding efforts. They helped us in the 80s, and now is a good opportunity to make a difference by helping their fellow Muslims with reconstruction and through private investment. We are still at the start of the Afghan mission and have a long ways to go for a few more years before we can reach sustainable levels.

Sasha Nagy: Mr. Ambassador: Thanks for taking this time to answer reader questions. As a closing comment, I would be interested in your opinion on the amount of engagement Canadians have in the future stability of your country. In reading the questions from readers, they seem to be very engaged and informed in the affairs of your country. Does this surprise you? Or have you become used to it given your dealings with Canadians over the past few years?

Ambassador Samad: I am moved by Canadians who care and are looking at ways to help. I see more and more compassionate and generous Canadians who have taken the time to read and learn about Afghanistan. I am also moved by the courage and dedication of the Canadian men and women who serve in Afghanistan. They truly believe in this mission and in its worth. We salute and will never forget those who made the ultimate sacrifice. Our hearts are with the families of those who gave their lives for a very noble cause. I come across Canadians who collect and offer wheelchairs, books, fire-fighting equipment, medical equipment, medicines and much more to reach the Afghans and help them. As an Afghan, I extend my heartfelt appreciation and hope that one day, when we have successfully accomplished our mission to help one of the world's poorest and most unfortunate nations, we could do as the Dutch did and send you Afghan tulips (wild ones mind you) as a sign of our gratitude. Thank you for this opportunity.