We need to create jobs for 300,000 youth graduating from high school in the next three years. We need to produce growth so we can have an economic system that can turn our natural wealth into a productive system. We need services, because poverty reduction cannot take place without effective citizenship.

Our current administration is a patchwork - some from the French, some from the Swiss, the Turks, the Ottomans; then the Russians came; now we have a global presence. We need to create a system that is organic and can function for the whole state. Currently, foreign policy here is domestic policy.

Peace cannot come without the engagement of those who have been before. Gen. Dostum will make peace possible. He was engaged in conflict of the past. Forgiveness is an extremely important part of our culture. But, like Rwanda and South Africa, we need to fashion our own solution.

My immediate priorities are peace and stability. I want to differentiate between stability and security: Stability comes from the hearts of people and acceptance of the judicial system. Security comes from the barrel of a gun and the threat of the use of force. We're seeing violence at an unprecedented level. We've become numb to bloodletting. Enduring peace cannot come unless we build a state that can guarantee our individual rights and obligations.

Peace is our goal, but peace from strength, an enduring peace that will bring regional cooperation. What we have emphasized and agreed is that we are strategic partners. We are bound by common interests and will act together to ensure both the safety of United States and the safety of Afghanistan. That is the important consideration. Numbers are a means; they are not an end in themselves.

As the leader of a country, you are not free to enjoy the luxury of such feelings. The Afghan people want peace, which requires persistence. We are determined to defend our country, and the whole region and the entire world understands the justice of our cause and the principled way in which we have engaged in it.

My priority is inclusion and justice. We need a system of justice that is applied across the board. That is what this country is striving for. We've suffered from a variety of exclusions. In the past, I compared our situation to a person with scissors who first cut the sleeve, then the fingers, then our body politic to pieces. My job is to stitch the wounds together. We need an agenda of inclusion: the youth, the women, the poor feel an enormous sense of exclusion.