Apology sought over NDP comment on Karzai speech.

Afghanistan is unlikely to get an apology from Layton. The evidence is fairly clear that there was at least a considerable input into the speech by the military. Dawn no doubt exaggerates in saying that the military wrote it but surely that is expected of politicians! Karzai wanted to taylor his speech to what would be most effective in the Canadian context, something that is hardly surprising. Naturally puppets want to appear independent and you shouldn't show their strings or exaggerate their number. It is not polite.

Apology sought over NDP comment on Karzai speech
Last Updated: Sunday, September 30, 2007 | 5:01 PM ET
CBC News
Afghanistan's ambassador to Canada says his country wants an apology from the NDP for alleging that Canada's defence staff essentially wrote Afghan President Hamid Karzai's speech to Parliament last year.


Afghanistan's ambassador to Canada speaking to CBC Newsworld on Sunday.
(CBC)
Omar Samad told CBC Newsworld on Sunday that one of his colleagues has demanded the NDP retract the accusation and apologize, because Afghan officials found it "insulting."

"We wrote the speech as Afghans and the president of Afghanistan delivered it to the Canadian people in Parliament, and that's where we stand," Samad said.

"It's an outrage that a political party here would not do its homework properly, would not go far enough into looking into this matter, would not understand how diplomatic relations, bilateral relations and arrangements for a visit work and would make such an allegation," he told Newsworld.

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Last Tuesday, NDP defence critic Dawn Black showed a government document suggesting a team of Canadian military advisers provided "key statistics, messages, themes, as well as overall structure" of Karzai's speech, given on Sept. 22, 2006.

Black said the document, obtained through an Access to Information request, shows that the initial draft of the president's speech was prepared by the Strategic Advisory Team, described in media reports as a group of mostly Canadian officers acting as advisers to the Karzai government.

"What Canadians heard was not the voice of the Afghan people, but the talking points of the Department of National Defence," said Black, whose party has called for the immediate withdrawal of Canadian troops from Afghanistan.

NDP Leader Jack Layton said Sunday he met with Karzai last year and was told by the Afghan president that there had to be a negotiated settlement in his country, and yet there was no mention of it in his speech to Parliament.

"Why not?" Layton asked. "Was he being told by Canadian officials and [Prime Minister] Stephen Harper's office that he shouldn't mention that a negotiation was a better way to go? He told me that in person virtually days from the date he made that speech.

"The evidence that we unearthed shows that Mr. Harper, through the officials, was trying to influence what Mr. Karzai said," Layton said. "We should be very concerned about that."

Last week, the ambassador said he and several other Afghan advisers prepared their own versions of the remarks and the final speech went through several drafts, which Karzai edited himself.