A fond farewell to an Afghan ambassador

He will be missed indeed--as good a person for the job as one can imagine. I have personally seen Mr Samad speak at small groups several times and have always been impressed with his forthrightness and gift for clear expression. His ability to put his country's case in television interviews was remarkable (an example here, August 26, 2008). He is a superb representative of his country and will serve it well in his new posting to France:

As Canadians came to grips with the sacrifice of their soldiers in Afghanistan and their increasingly complicated mission, Omar Samad was both the face and an elegant spokesman for a war-torn country.

Afghanistan's envoy to Canada, Omar Samad, said Friday he disagreed with Prime Minister Stephen Harper’s suggestion the Taliban insurgency cannot be defeated.
Photograph by: Bruno Schlumberger, Ottawa Citizen

After 4 1/2 years as Afghanistan's ambassador to Canada, Samad is leaving Ottawa.

Before the month is out, Samad will begin his new job as Kabul's man in Paris.

Though he impressed Canadians with his fluency in French, Samad's new diplomatic assignment will be a tough one because the Afghanistan war is less popular in France than in Canada.

Jawed Ludin, Afghanistan's current ambassador to Norway and a former chief of staff to Afghan President Hamid Karzai, will take over from Samad in Ottawa.

Samad acknowledged that changes such as these are all part of a diplomat's life. But as Afghanistan's only post-9/11 envoy to Canada, Samad also said the job had cemented deep bonds not only for his immediate family but with his country.

"Canada will be on our minds. We have been able to establish very strong linkages between the two nations, and our histories are now intertwined," said Samad, whose two young sons were born on Canada during his term here.

"There have been some major challenges we have faced over the last few years, some harder than others to tackle, but I think that Canadians can also be very proud for what it has, and continues to do in a very far, remote and poor country such as Afghanistan."

Samad arrived in Canada as the Taliban insurgency gained a new life and eventually pushed the Canadian Forces' death toll to 118. Samad's job was to sell the merits of the mission to the Canadian public, while never forgetting the blood and treasure that their sons and daughters were investing to improve the lives of people ravaged by a generation of violence.

Most recently, Samad had to explain Afghanistan's controversial new bill that was seen as a Taliban-style clampdown on Shia women. The bill, which is under review, sparked outrage in Canada because it would have essentially forced Shia women to bend to the will of their husbands, sexually and financially.

During their time in Ottawa, Samad's wife, Korshied, became an informal ambassador in her own right for Afghan women, as she presented a thoroughly modern face for the women of her country to Canadians.

The two met in Kabul after 9/11, drawn back to their homeland years after their parents had fled Afghanistan and settled in the United States.

Korshied was an American television news producer, about to jump from ABC to Fox News, while Omar went to work in his country's fledgling foreign affairs ministry...

After being posted to Ottawa, the Samads had two sons, now aged 33 months and 13 months.

Both of them managed to earn masters degrees while based in Ottawa: Korshied got her masters in communication from the University of Ottawa, while Omar got his masters in international relations through the "interactive program" of the Fletcher School at Tufts University.

Samad said he and his wife leave Ottawa with "very mixed emotions in terms of the intensity of this posting."