NATO Summit

Toby Perkins Excerpts

Monday 22nd November 2010 Commons Chamber

[The Prime Minister]

My hon. Friend is right to raise that issue, which is a difficult one. Not only has there been an insufficiency of Pashtuns in the security forces, but there has been an insufficiency of Pashtuns from Helmand and elsewhere in that part of the country. That means that we must make a greater effort to recruit and retain them, but I think that as they see progress on the ground they will be more likely to want to serve.

Let me make clear that we are on track to achieve the 2011 goal of 171,600 in the Afghan national army—the current force is 138,000—and to reach the October 2011 target of 134,000 in the Afghan national police, who currently number 120,000. Plainly, those are not unrealistic objectives, but the point about the ethnic make-up is important.

[Toby Perkins (Chesterfield) (Lab)]

The Prime Minister is right to say that the country has paid a tremendous debt to Afghanistan in terms of the cost to our country. He said earlier that he would send a message to our friends and allies by setting a deadline, but he also sends a message to our enemies by setting that deadline. What impact does he think the deadline will have on al-Qaeda and the Taliban? Does he think that it will make them more likely to want to negotiate?

[The Prime Minister]

The point is that the Taliban have suffered huge reverses in Helmand and southern Afghanistan, particularly over the past year, and a serious attrition in their numbers. As for what I have said, I have not been talking about 2010, as my predecessor did, or about 2011; I have been talking about 2015.

I think the Taliban know that they are losing militarily and suffering huge attrition in their numbers. They should also know that, as well as the military hammer that is hitting them, there is the option of a political process allowing them to reintegrate at a low level, and that, with the Afghan Government, there are opportunities for reconciliation at a higher level. If we look across the world at the way in which counter-insurgencies have ended, we see that they have normally ended through a combination of military might and a political process, and I believe that the same applies in this instance.