A new monument honouring Canadian soldiers who died in Afghanistan may find a new home in Centretown after Defence Minister Peter MacKay announced the repatriation of a memorial to Canadian soldiers who died fighting in Afghanistan.
While the National Capital Commission wouldn’t confirm the site for the new monument, it refused to rule out sites in the Centretown, such as the LeBreton flats, Parliament Hill or even near the National War memorial.
The white marble cenotaph – and plaques listing the fallen – stands 21 metres high and eight metres wide. It has spent the last eight years in Kandahar at the Canadian air field. The monument will be the first one created for a conflict since the Korean war.
The Canadian Forces is hoping for the memorial to be finished by 2014, the scheduled end date of the mission in Afghanistan.
MacKay made the announcement while attending the Remembrance Day ceremonies in Kandahar.
“The intention is to bring this memorial back to Canada to repatriate it, and to do so very quickly,” said MacKay. “We want to properly protect this monument, these names, these faces etched in granite here will be put on permanent display in an appropriate place in the nation's capital.”
MacKay said he wanted the sacrifices of modern Canadian soldiers to be recognized by their country.
“We need to continue and ensure that our modern veterans do feel that the country is behind them and supporting them and there when they need them most,” MacKay said.
Lieut. Greg Menzies, a public affairs officer for the Canadian Forces, says the military will work with the National Capital Commission in finding an appropriate site.
“This is a joint effort on the part of the military and the NCC,” Menzies says. “The Canadian Forces will detail criteria it believes important for the cenotaph site including sanctity, free public access, and that the location be a place for reflection and remembrance.”
“There’s many possibilities and that is what we’ll be looking at in the coming months,” says Charles Cardinal, a media advisory officer for the NCC.
Menzies ruled out the possibility of the memorial finding it’s way to the Canadian War Museum due to the Armed Forces insistence on it to being placed in an area where people won’t have to pay an admission fee.
With 158 soldiers having already died in Afghanistan and the possibility of more, new names will continue to be etched into the memorial until the end of the mission.
Local community associations hope the NCC will engage the community when determining a location for the memorial.
“The first thought that comes to mind is the intersection of Bronson, Commissioner, Albert and Slater,” says Eric Darwin, president of the Dalhousie Community Association, “It’s a prominently visible sight from all directions.”
However, Darwin says that the scheduled construction along the route would be an impediment.
A site for the memorial will be announced in early 2012.