Afghan mission hits home for Liberal MP Allan Woods, CanWest News Service
Published: Friday, September 22, 2006
OTTAWA - He was a hundred metres away from the Afghan man on the bicycle who detonated a bomb, and now the 20-year-old soldier lies in a German hospital. A toe-twitch is the only indication he may have avoided paralysis.
On the other side of the world, a parliamentarian is struggling with the deadly toll of Canada's military mission in Afghanistan.
Liberal MP Dan McTeague was a ball of stress and emotion Thursday, coping with the weight of knowing his cousin's son had been severely wounded in a suicide bombing in the Panjwaii district of Kandahar province earlier this week, and understanding that that same mission has divided the very chamber where he goes to work each day.
''It brings it a lot closer to home,'' McTeague said in a telephone interview. ''We (parliamentarians) are human after all, and we do know that they are there, certainly, with risks. There are risks attendant to young and women volunteering themselves to help the people of Afghanistan.''