The Canada-Afghanistan Solidarity Committee is dedicated to the building of civil institutions and the ordinary freedoms and human rights that we take for granted in Canada. Many times, we have pointed out the need for Afghanistan's leaders and their international supporters to call abusers and violators out -- indeed, we have never committed unmitigated support for any particular politicians, but rather the fledgling democratic system of Afghanistan.

There is no question that human rights are violated by government sanctioned operators in Afghanistan. Reports are rife of official corruption, brutalities carried out by a duly-appointed judiciary and the depradations of the police upon the very people they are meant to protect. CASC condemns these things.

By the very nature of the awful frequency of these brutalities, it must be admitted that CASC does not have the internal resources to make statements covering all violations as they occur or even promptly thereafter, though we have tried in the past to keep up. This brings us to a harsh bit of criticism on one Canadian blog:

Said Musa, who has been held without trial, tortured and beaten by his guards, sodomized and raped by his fellow prisoners and asked to renounce his Christian faith has been told all will be well if he simply converts back to Islam. It appears there will be no Condoleeza Rice moment by Hillary Clinton to intervene on behalf of the US as occurred in a similar case in 2006. Indeed, as Obama puffs out his chest and declares the Taliban will never return to Afghanistan, it is quite obvious the enemy is determined regardless, and Tali-bad-dudes or not, the same law seems to apply.

And from Terry Glavin and his Canadian Afghanistan Solidarity Committee (CASC) friends there has been nary a peep. As I’ve said before, the hope for a better future in Afghanistan is doomed to the wretched existence under Islam which all Afghanis must endure. Under ISAF’s military gains on behalf of the Afghan people, what good are the humanitarian efforts by Glavin and his friends if those who are helped remain in the embrace of Islam, and through their cultish existence, are keen to normalize the inhumanity of their ideology? Said Musa epitomizes the anti-reason for the presence of Western nations in Afghanistan, and it delegitimizes what the CASC and their supporters are trying to do.

While individual CASC members have indeed condemned the treatment of Said Musa and what it represents in the bigger picture elsewhere, we have not made a strong statement on this website regarding this specific case -- until now.

Our members are absolutely united in condemning the horrific treatment of Said Musa. Likewise, we condemn the horrendous outrages committed in the name of "Islamic justice", whether by the Taliban or by the official government of Afghanistan and its courts.

We want Said Musa released. And if some Afghans would surely threaten him upon his release, we want the government of Afghanistan to do their duty according to their own constitution and its claim to respect the human rights of their citizens.

We want him protected. Of course, we wish that there were no need for that protection, but the awful reality is that intolerance is not merely the preserve of corrupt officials in Afghanistan.

We have always taken a consistent line in this regard. Failure to effect change is no reflection of our intentions or the earnest work of our colleagues. Transforming Afghanistan is a challenging prospect, but one that needs to be undertaken.

We absolutely disagree with the idea that we are "keen to normalize the inhumanity" of the worst abuses and crimes committed in the name of political Islam, whether by the Taliban or others.

The point of our work is to engage Afghans, support the people in their aim to build a country that respects human rights and does not act as a haven for international gangsters and terrorists.

According to consultations we have undertaken with the Canadan-Afghan community and across a wide spectrum of society in Afghanistan, the vast majority still want Canada to remain involved, help their country achieve stability, help them recover and build civil institutions so that they might one day achieve something of the status of a "normal" country; a place where people can learn, work and offer some sort of future for their children -- a place not governed by corrupt officials or tyrannical religious zealots.

We are realistic that there are significant numbers of people in Afghanistan working against these positive goals. Some of them work for the Taliban. Many do not, but are essentially aligned with that movement's xenophobic, mysoginist and brutal aims. These people exist. But we believe they do not represent the future of the country; that is, they will not represent the future of Afghanistan if the rest of the country stands against them and we do not abandon our allies.

Overcoming this segment of society in a country placing at or near the bottom of virtually any index from literacy to poverty and freedom is not going to be easy. And realistically, we will have to continue to condemn brutalities and violations carried out by those who have utterly failed in their charge of helping lead and build their own society.

But abandoning the people of Afghanistan and leaving them to be eaten up by their worst elements is not an option. Not for us.

Grant Kippen and Scott Worden outline the consequences of a crisis over Afghanistan's 2010 election for the rule of law and democracy in that country.

Today would have been the first day of Afghanistan's second elected Parliament, had it not been for Afghan President Hamid Karzai's announcement on Wednesday that the inauguration should be postponed for a month to allow a specially created tribunal to rule on election disputes. If the extraordinary five-member panel of judges appointed by Karzai to review fraud nullifies the results of the September 2010 vote, it will provoke a Constitutional crisis and leave Afghanistan without a legitimate Parliament at a time when national unity is urgently needed to fight the insurgency and manage a delicate reintegration process with militants. The delay is also a strong signal that the international community's $500 million investment in Afghan elections over the past two years, and a fundamental pillar of the rule of law in Afghanistan, is about to fail.

The heart of the crisis is a dispute over who has the final say in deciding the results of Afghan elections.  The Electoral Law is clear: the country's Independent Election Commission (IEC) and the separate Electoral Complaints Commission (ECC) are responsible for investigating fraud and certifying results, which they released on November 24, 2010.  Unhappy with the outcome, however, the Afghan government has created a new forum that it hopes will reach a different but more amiable result for the President -- either by ordering recounts in certain provinces or by overturning decisions made by the ECC that went against Karzai allies.  If successful, the majority of Afghans who have accepted the results will know that despite the international community's rhetoric over the past ten years, political expediency matters more in Afghanistan than their votes or the law.

Author and journalist Christopher Hitchens on why the West must continue to remain engaged in Afghanistan.

With Canadian Liberal MP Bob Rae's articulate latest display of courage regarding the Afghanistan mission, we do hope that media pundits and political commentators of all stripes get the message: the values of defending democracy and human rights abroad ought to be something that transcends politics.

Yes, politics is and should be a factor. But let's remember why we got involved in the first place. An excerpt from Bob Rae's statement on Afghanistan:

No doubt there might be short term partisan advantage in playing to the gallery about its fatigue with the Afghanistan engagement. It is a difficult, frustrating, costly, and painful military and political conflict. It is hard to see a road to success, and hard as well to see much progress in the life and condition of the people. “Troops out now” would win much applause.

We went into Afghanistan with our NATO partners, with the full approval of the United Nations. It is one of the poorest countries in the world, ravaged by 30 years of civil war. Al Qaeda and other extremist groups have found a haven in the south of the country and the north of Pakistan.

Of course all issues are about politics. But some issues can transcend partisanship. In every other country in the NATO alliance there is multipartisan support for efforts in Afghanistan, a willingness to discuss options, in a climate of public candour.

Why should Canada be any different ? Our political culture is now all about trench warfare. Everything is supposed to seen through a partisan lens, and everything played to short term advantage. Anyone who asks “what’s best for Afghanistan ?”, or “what’s best for Canada, our role as a reliable member of NATO and the UN ?” is portrayed as some kind of poor sap who doesn’t “get” politics.

It’s called doing what you think is right, talking to the public about it, and worrying less about who gets credit. There’s something almost pathological about the state of our politics, to say nothing of political commentary, if we can’t have that kind of conversation.