Afghan chaos growing Options

[ghostgovt]

The UN has announced that Afghanistan is in very bad ways. I read also the other day that the US is doubling it's troops there. Infind it more than interesting that in the UN's closing statements, that Afghanistan has deeply suffered in more than it's 20 yrs of war. That would be back when the US CIA created the Bin Laden Taliban and war with Russia. Another intervention by our govt that has left a country in shambles and depending on more financial aid from American taxpayers.




UN warns of fresh Afghan chaos

BBC
21.02.2005

[Afghanistan remains one of the world's poorest states and without action could plunge into chaos, once again posing an international threat, a UN report says.

Three years after the US campaign to topple the Taleban, there were serious problems in areas such as health, employment and education, it said]

[ Illicit drugs were still a major part of the Afghan economy and it was now the world's leading producer of opium. Physical violence by armed militias and attacks by the Taleban were still going on, the report added.

And while the legal economy had grown by 25 to 30% since the fall of the Taleban, there has been little trickle-down to the poorest sectors of society, according to the UN.

If such grievances were not addressed, "Afghanistan will collapse into an insecure state, a threat to its own people as well as the international community", it said.

'War to blame'

Speaking at the report's launch, Afghanistan's minister for rural development, Hanif Atmar, acknowledged how dire things were.

"It's painful but this is nothing new. We all knew it," he said, referring to the country's poverty ranking.

The report noted that most people interviewed had expressed pessimism and fear that they had been bypassed by reconstruction.

The authors conclude that more than 20 years of war is more to blame for the situation than any other factor.]

[heritage]

Afghans' poppy crop smaller than last year's
Sunday, February 13, 2005
By N.C. Aizenman, The Washington Post

http://www.post-gazette.com/pg/05044/456330.stm

....Across Afghanistan, government officials and foreign aid workers who monitor poppy cultivation have reached a remarkable conclusion: One year after Afghan farmers planted the largest amount of poppy in their nation's history and provided the world with nearly 90 percent of its opium supply, many of them have stopped growing it.

Poppy farming, officials said, may have declined by as much as 70 percent in three provinces that together account for more than half of Afghanistan's production: Nangahar in the east, Helmand in the south and Badakhshan in the north.....

Several factors may be responsible, including a drop in opium prices after the previous banner harvest, and a reluctance to plant among farmers whose crops were destroyed last season by disease or the police.....

"People will need other sources of income as soon as possible, or we'll be the witness to a big disaster," said Gen. Muhammad Daoud, deputy interior minister in charge of counter-narcotics.....

In December, the top commander in Afghanistan, Lt. Gen. David Barno, reportedly warned visiting officials, including Vice President Dick Cheney and Defense Secretary Donald Rumsfeld, that drug lords were expanding their influence in the Afghan government and could form ties with Taliban fighters.....

International donors have pledged millions to help Afghanistan combat drugs this year; the United States pledged about $780 million. About $120 million of the U.S. assistance package has been earmarked for work on irrigation canals, to improve roads, to create micro-credit systems, and to obtain better seeds and fertilizers so poppy workers can make a living from other crops and industries.

In Nangahar, the first phase of that effort has already begun, with plans to hire about 50,000 workers to do jobs such as clearing irrigation canals. In a largely symbolic gesture, the U.S. government has also distributed 500 metric tons of wheat seeds in Nangahar -- enough for less than 5 percent to 10 percent of farmers, Afghan officials said.

But it will take until at least early spring to start up more lasting infrastructure improvements, U.S. officials said.

[heritage]

Afghan Living Standards Among the Lowest, U.N. Finds
By CARLOTTA GALL
Published: February 22, 2005

Afghanistan ranked 173rd of 178 countries in the U.N. 2004 Human Development Index, according to a new report.

The New York Times [MUST LOG IN]

[What has our $1 billion per month tax dollars gone to over the last 3 years?]

ANDAHAR, Afghanistan, Feb. 21 - Three years after the United States drove the Taliban out of Afghanistan and vowed to rebuild, the war-shattered country ranked 173rd of 178 countries in the United Nations 2004 Human Development Index, according to a new report from the United Nations. .....

The survey, "National Human Development Report: Security With a Human Face," released Monday in Kabul, is the first comprehensive look at the state of development in Afghanistan in 30 years. In addition to ranking Afghanistan in the development index for the first time, the report warned that Afghanistan could revert to anarchy if its dire poverty, poor health and insecurity were not improved.....

While there has been rapid progress, said Zphirin Diabr, associate administrator of the United Nations Development Program, the country has a long way to go just to get back to where it was 20 years ago. The figures, as President Hamid Karzai says in the report's introduction, paint a gloomy picture.....

Average life expectancy for Afghanistan's 28.5 million people is 44.5 years, at least 20 years lower than that of neighboring countries...One of two Afghans can be classified as poor, and 20.4 percent of the rural population does not have enough to eat, getting less than the benchmark of 2,070 calories a day. More than half of the population has suffered from the effects of a prolonged drought, the report said....Most glaring are the inequalities that affect women and children, still some of the worst social indicators in the world today....

Afghanistan now has the worst education system in the world, the report concluded, and one of the lowest adult literacy rates, 28.7 percent. Annual per capita income was $190 and the unemployment rate 25 percent, said Hanif Atmar, the minister of rehabilitation and rural development.

"Obviously this is a warning," the minister said of the report. "It shows why we are poor, how and in what way we can solve this."

The success of Afghanistan depends on improved security, political reform, broad-based economic development and gradual elimination of poppy production, Mr. McKechnie said, adding that failure in any of those areas would imperil the reconstruction of the state country and the living conditions of the people.

[heritage]

http://www.myafghan.com/

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Tuesday, February 22, 2005

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Afghan plane crash site yields 46 bodies 2:05 PM
KABUL, Feb 22 (AFP) - Forty-six bodies have been recovered about two and a half weeks after an Afghan plane crashed into a mountain near Kabul killing all 104 people on board, officials said Tuesday. "To date we have found 46 intact bodies and some human remains and ... read full article


Afghan winter kills 180 children 2:04 PM
KABUL, Afghanistan (AP) -- At least 180 children have died in Afghanistan's coldest winter in years, the health minister said Tuesday, amid warnings that the final toll from the subzero temperatures and heavy snow could run into the thousands. The government has yet t ... read full article


2,000 government workers set to begin census of Afghans in Pakistan 2:04 PM
ISLAMABAD, Feb. 22 (UNHCR) – A two-week long nationwide census of Afghans living in Pakistan is due to start Wednesday in a bid to provide the first comprehensive picture of the Afghans who arrived in Pakistan in several waves since their country was engulfed in civil confli ... read full article

[heritage]

Monday, February 21, 2005
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UN: Afghanistan Could Become Terror Haven

http://www.myafghan.com/todayall.asp?whatdate=2/21/2005


...."Curbing corruption, bringing reconstruction gains to all regions of Afghanistan, drawing in foreign investment in a secure involvement and opening up the political process to participation remain the top priorities," Karzai wrote. "As the country now turns a new leaf, our ambition is to give hope to each and every Afghan."

The 288-page report by the United Nations Development Program paints a mixed picture of the country's re-emergence since U.S. forces drove out the former ruling Taliban for harboring al-Qaida leader Osama bin Laden in late 2001.....

"Our team found the overwhelming majority of people hold a sense of pessimism and fear that reconstruction is bypassing them," said Daud Saba, one of the report's authors.

The report was also critical of the U.S.-led military engagement in Afghanistan, saying it helped produce a climate of "fear, intimidation, terror and lawlessness" and neglected the longer-term threat to security posed by inequality and injustice.

It also described reconstruction projects sponsored by the U.S. military as "inadequate and dangerous," echoing concern from some relief groups that they have blurred the lines between soldiers and civilians, and made aid workers into militant targets.

Still, it stressed the need for Afghanistan to develop its own national army and police - two projects which the United States is currently trying to accelerate - and proceed with a belated U.N. disarmament drive for factional militias.

On Sunday, a U.S. military spokesman said Washington has doubled the number of soldiers embedded in the Afghan army to speed the training of a fledgling force that is shouldering more of the security burden.

A group of 288 U.S. National Guard soldiers arrived in Afghanistan on Friday and Saturday to serve as trainers with the Afghan National Army, joining about 300 already assigned to Afghan units, Maj. Eric Bloom said....

[searchingforsani...]

Adventures in delusion:

http://www.alertnet.org/thenews/newsdesk/N17299126.htm

[QUOTE]

Limbaugh to visit Afghanistan with US aid official
18 Feb 2005 01:40:10 GMT

Source: Reuters

WASHINGTON, Feb 17 (Reuters) - Conservative radio talk show host Rush Limbaugh is expected to visit Afghanistan with the top U.S. aid official to spotlight America's aid work there, officials said on Thursday.

Political commentator Mary Matalin, a former White House aide to Vice President Dick Cheney, will also be on the trip. She said she was not being paid to go and would pay her own way to Dubai but she believed the U.S. government would cover the cost of her visit to Afghanistan from there.

The Bush administration has come under sharp criticism for the Education Department's payment of $240,000 to conservative commentator Armstrong Williams to tout President George W. Bush's education plan.

Spokesmen for Limbaugh were not immediately available to comment.

"It's trying to get people to pay attention to all the good things we are doing in Afghanistan," a U.S. official who asked not to be named said of the trip, which is expected to take place next week. "This is just a different kind of outreach."[/QUOTE]

[heritage]

CNN female reporter, Daryl Kagan was reportedly going to Afghanistan with Limbaugh (as his new girl friend) but she bowed out at the last minute. The rumor was Limbaugh was to propose on the trip - Kagan would be his 4th wife.]

I won't watch her anymore when she is on CNN.

If anyone can debunk this report, let me know. I saw a news article over the weekend.

[brendan]

Afghanistan could slide back into chaos
Rachel Morarjee
Posted Mon, 21 Feb 2005


Although Afghanistan's legal economy has grown by 25 to 30 percent since the fall of the Taliban, there has been little trickle-down to the poorest echelons of society, according to the UN.

http://iafrica.com/news/features/415982.htm

[heritage]

Snow paralyses Afghan villages
By Andrew North
BBC News, Kabul

http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/world/south_asia/4286233.stm

There is concern in Afghanistan about the condition of thousands of people living in remote villages cut off by weeks of heavy snow.

Officials say the severe winter has killed more than 260 people. ....

This is a common story across Afghanistan, where many people in snowbound villages have succumbed to infections like pneumonia or whooping cough.

This is Afghanistan's harshest winter for at least a decade, officials say.

But there is no doubt the country's war-shattered infrastructure has made things much worse.

The government has had to rely on the US military and foreign relief agencies to get help to many places.

The situation is still unclear in some areas, especially in the west. In some districts, roads are blocked by more than three metres of snow.

[ghostgovt]

By this article's report, after the winter thaw... the Taliban is gearing up for larger assaults on US forces in Afghanistan... and at a time when farmers will be trying to plant crops, etc etc.

http://english.aljazeera.net/NR/exeres/EB3...52192497B23.htm
Ubaid Allah, a former Taliban defence minister regarded as an associate of the elusive Taliban leader Mullah Muhammad Umar, is alleged to have made the statement via satellite phone from an undisclosed location.

"Bad weather is the reason for the reduction in attacks," he said.

"We will step up attacks as the weather changes. The Taliban movement is active under the leadership of Mullah Muhammad Umar. And Taliban will fight till the last Talib is alive."

However, a group of former Taliban fighters are said to have embraced a US-backed reconciliation drive, while the US military says that, three years after the Taliban government fell, fighting is waning.

[nnrecrut]

The people in Afghanistan are dependent on their drug industry--it is all they have. Interestingly, I remember Tony Blair making the argument to support the US in attacking the Taliban because the heroin from Afghan was a huge problem for Brits. Blair seemed to make the case that taking out the Taliban would help solve the heroin crisis in UK and other European countries.

However, the opposite is true--Afghanistan's drug industry is stronger than ever and growing everyday. Russia has a devastating aids and heroin crisis from the drugs coming in from Afghanistan.

[heritage]

UK attempt to eradicate Afghan opium fails

http://www.guardian.co.uk/afghanistan/stor...1428288,00.html

Alan Travis, home affairs editor
Wednesday March 2, 2005
The Guardian

Afghanistan is on the verge of becoming a "narcotic state" with its biggest annual crop of opium since the overthrow of the Taliban, the United Nations drug control board warns today.

The International Narcotics Control Board reports that the opium crop in Afghanistan - which is the source of more than 90% of the heroin sold on Britain's streets - reached a bumper 4,200 tonnes, up 800 tonnes on the previous year.

The rise is a blow to Tony Blair who told the Labour party conference in 2000 that the war against the Taliban was an opportunity to eradicate the poppy harvest which is the source of three-quarters of all the world's heroin.

[ghostgovt]

UK attempt to eradicate Afghan opium fails

http://www.guardian.co.uk/afghanistan/stor...1428288,00.html

Alan Travis, home affairs editor
Wednesday March 2, 2005
The Guardian

Afghanistan is on the verge of becoming a "narcotic state" with its biggest annual crop of opium since the overthrow of the Taliban, the United Nations drug control board warns today.

The International Narcotics Control Board reports that the opium crop in Afghanistan - which is the source of more than 90% of the heroin sold on Britain's streets - reached a bumper 4,200 tonnes, up 800 tonnes on the previous year.

The rise is a blow to Tony Blair who told the Labour party conference in 2000 that the war against the Taliban was an opportunity to eradicate the poppy harvest which is the source of three-quarters of all the world's heroin.

I read a few months ago that planes sprayed opium fields with killing agents of which upset many Afghanistanian growers and demanding who was responsible for this. They accussed both Britain and the US for these secret spraying missions. No one claimed responsibility for it. I was concerned of what was sprayed and it's long term effect on the population with such poisons in the ground.

I also imagine that any attempt to grow food crops in the same area may also be affected by this.

[piccadilly]

I read a few months ago that planes sprayed opium fields with killing agents of which upset many Afghanistanian growers and demanding who was responsible for this.
...

"US helicopters in secret mission to spray Afghanistan's opium fields"
Luke Harding in Zafar Khel
Monday June 9, 2003
The Guardian

http://www.guardian.co.uk/international/st...73463%2C00.html


Afghans probe 'poppy spray' claim
By Pam O'Toole
BBC News
Published: 2005/02/08 20:51:50 GMT

http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/south_asia/4248217.stm


Mistrust hampers Afghan opium battle
By Andrew North
BBC correspondent, Tora Bora
Published: 2004/12/04 00:55:12 GMT

http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/world/south_asia/4066525.stm

This post has been edited by picadilly: Mar 2 2005, 02:08 PM

[piccadilly]

EXTRACT: "This weekend, the American development agency USAID is due to
announce the distribution of 500 tonnes of wheat seed for Nangahar province,
of which Tora Bora is a part."

USAID are distributing some kind of wheat seeds in opium-growing areas of
Afghanistan whilst spraying these areas with Monsanto's Glyphosate (see items
below).

Glyphosate is a broad-spectrum herbicide that will kill all
conventional crops - but not GM herbicide-resistant crops. Monsanto's GM
wheat (MON 71800), which is modified to be glyphosate-resistant, is one of
the few crops that would survive such applications.

Meanwhile the US has imposed laws in Iraq forbidding farmers from saving
their own seeds. In a nation where 97% of farmers save their own seeds they will
now be forced to buy seeds from multinationals - the leading company
being... Monsanto. See: GRAIN, "FAO declares war on farmers, not hunger", New from

Grain, 16 June 2004, http://www.grain.org/front/?id=24

[ghostgovt]

Appreciate the articles picadilly.

here's a couple extra zingers going on lately in ole Afghanistan.

1) wonder what we'll use of all this land for? secret military bases... secret 'growing' fields?

http://www.iribnews.ir/Full_en.asp?news_id=188042&n=31

Kabul, Feb 27 - The government of Afghanistan signed a memorandum of understanding for conceding a 33,000-square-meter piece of land in Kabul to the U.S. government.

********************************************************************

2) I find this a little odd that the first lady (wife of President Mohammad Khatami) of Iran vists Afghanistan... since Iran is such a baaaaad country.

http://news.xinhuanet.com/english/2005-03/...ent_2634236.htm

KABUL, March 1 (Xinhuanet)-- The first lady of the Islamic Republic of Iran Mrs. Zahra Sadiqi arrived here Tuesday for a three-day official visit to the Afghan capital Kabul.

As wife of Iranian President Mohammad Khatami, Zahra Sadiqi's visit is taking place at the invitation of Afghan first lady ZinatKarzai, presidential spokesman Jawed Ludin said.

"The visit by such a dignitary from Iran would further enhance bilateral relations between the two countries," Ludin noted.

Afghanistan's first lady paid a visit to Iran last year.

[heritage]

Report documents poverty and social misery in Afghanistan

http://www.afgha.com/?af=article&sid=48009

World Socialist Web Site
2 March 2005
Joanne Laurier

A recent United Nations report on social conditions in Afghanistan provides a glimpse of the social reality behind the American media’s talk of a “new democracy” and the supposedly benevolent role of the US government in that country.

A quarter of a century after Washington intervened to support Islamic fundamentalist forces fighting a pro-Soviet government in Kabul, and three years after the American military invaded Afghanistan to overthrow the Taliban regime, the war-torn nation ranks 173rd out of 178 countries in the United Nations 2004 Human Development Index. Only a handful of sub-Saharan African nations suffer more wretched conditions....

The infant and maternal mortality rates are among the highest in the world, with life expectancy at least 20 years shorter than in neighboring countries....

Only 25 percent of the population has access to clean drinking water—one in eight children die from lack of the resource. One of two Afghans can be classified as poor, with 20.4 percent of the rural population consuming less than 2,070 calories per person per day. Only Niger, Burkina Faso and Mali have lower literacy rates....

Only 14 percent of women are literate, and the rate of pregnancy-related deaths is 60 times higher than for women in industrial countries. Seventy percent of those affected by tuberculosis are women.....

look what we have wrought....

The relationship between the state, the warlords and the narco-mafia bosses have added to the level of psychological “insecurity.” The report quotes a man from Jalalabad who provides a description of the dysfunctional, US-supported government of President Hamid Karzai: “It has no education policy, it has no health policy, it has no economic policy, it has no environmental policy, it has no security policy. It just takes everything by the day and many of the days are bad.”....

Until the late 1990s, the US turned a blind eye to the extremely regressive social policies of the Taliban, which had come to power in 1994. Under the Taliban, according to the report, “the war economy was further consolidated and Afghanistan became the world’s major source of opium.” The September 11 terrorist attacks provided the Bush administration with the pretext to invade Afghanistan and oust the Taliban regime.

The years following the US invasion witnessed “a deeply embedded war economy, which leaves the majority of Afghans living in heightened states of both fear and want.” This era has seen an expansion of narco-warlordism and the opium trade. It is estimated that in 2003, Afghanistan produced three-quarters of the world illicit opium, and officials warn that the country could become “a narco-terror state in the future.”

The survey also contends that besides opium, trafficking in archeological artifacts has been a source of booty, estimating that since 1992, approximately 75 percent of the ancient artifacts belonging to the National Museum in Kabul have been smuggled out of the country.

Security with a Human Face presents a harrowing picture of a country whose “free election” last October was timed to provide Bush with a pre-election boost. The prescriptions advanced by the report in its later chapters for a stable and democratic society appear absurd in light of current Afghan reality: foreign imperialist occupation, political power in the hands of mafia-like warlords; unspeakable conditions for broad masses of the population. .....

[heritage]

http://www.afgha.com/?af=news

NATO Sends Peacekeepers Into Western Afghanistan
The Peace Process
Radio Free Europe / Radio Liberty
Wednesday, 02 March 2005

NATO today began an expansion of its forces into western Afghanistan as part of efforts to rebuild the region.

The commander of the 8,300-strong International Security Assistance Force said today that an initial deployment of Italian troops started to arrive in the western city of Herat. The commander, Turkish Lieutenant General Ethem Erdagi, said the Italians will later be joined by soldiers from Spain, Greece, and Lithuania.

Italian Troops Begin Arriving in Western Afghanistan
The Peace Process
VOA News
02 March 2005

Italian soldiers have begun arriving in western Afghanistan, under plans by NATO to expand its peacekeeping mission in the country.

The Turkish commander of the International Security Assistance Force in Afghanistan, Lieutenant General Ethem Erdagi, said an initial deployment of Italian troops started to arrive today in the main western city of Herat. Soldiers from Spain, Greece and Lithuania are due in the region later.

Polio vaccination campaign gets under way
Humanitarian situation
IRIN
01 Mar 2005

The Afghan government, working in conjunction with the UN Children's Fund (UNICEF), launched a three-day national polio vaccination campaign on Tuesday in an effort to finally eradicate the virus from the country.

An estimated 5.3 million Afghan children under the age of five will receive the life-saving polio vaccine under the National Immunisation Days (NID) campaign.

Getting more women into politics
Internal Politics
IRIN
02 Mar 2005

The United Nations and the Ministry of Women's Affairs (MoWA) called on Afghan political parties on Wednesday to promote and support female candidates for the upcoming parliamentary elections.

The first parliamentary elections in Afghanistan under newly elected President Hamid Karzai were scheduled to be held in May but were postponed last week for security and logistical reasons.

Rumsfeld sued over prison abuse
Human Rights
BBC News
Wednesday, 2 March, 2005

US Defence Secretary Donald Rumsfeld is being sued by two civil liberties group for allegedly authorising torture and then failing to stop it.

The American Civil Liberties Union and Human Rights First have filed a lawsuit on behalf of eight men who claim abuse by US forces in Iraq and Afghanistan.

World Bank says drugs now Afghanistan's economic lynchpin
Economy
Tribune de Genève
Mercredi 2 mars 2005

Drugs are now the staple of Afghanistan's economy, locking the country in a cycle of poverty and violence and leaving a minority of the population with the bulk of the wealth, the World Bank said on Wednesday.

Opium "has become Afghanistan's leading economic activity. By 2004 the opium spread to all of Afghanistan's provinces," a report by the Washington-based bank said.

[heritage]

Afghanistan's Web Sitehttp://www.afghanistans.com/

When you think Afghanistan Imagine

Where 20 years of war has totally crippled the economy, and you must try to somehow survive day-by-day by scrounging enough food to feed your children. Where people do not have the facilities to receive an education. Where people do not have the facilities to receive treatment at hospitals. Where, on average, men die at 40 years of age and women at 43. Where hundreds of thousands of people are maimed, disabled, or blind because of war and land mines. Where you face a high chance of becoming blind or crippled because of the lack of fresh fruit and vegetables, causing vitamin deficiency. If you are blind or crippled, no one can help you because those that are not blind or crippled need help as well.

----------------

ABC Nightline did a show last night about a family in Afghanistam. The daughter has an enlarged heart condition and must travel over 1 hour to see a doctor once per month. The doctor sees hundreds of childred a day. There are no heart doctors in Afghanistan. She must go to India and the medical cost is $10,000. The family of 6 lived in the country but were run out and now are sqautters in a one room run-down bulding with no running water or heat. The father cannot find work so the little girl works.

[ghostgovt]

Unfortunately, wrongfull kills in any community never makes for cooperative locals... and this incident may come back to haunt some US troops in the region that this took place. Especially being this close to Iran.


http://www.khilafah.com/home/category.php?...D=10802&TagID=2

U.S. soldiers Executed Afghan villagers

03 Mar2005


SHINDAND — Several U.S. soldiers are under investigation for killing two Afghan villagers outside a U.S. base in western Afghanistan, the commander of the base, Lt. Col. Ashton Hayes, announced last week.

Witnesses and local officials said the two villagers were shot Feb. 11while they fled across a field, according to witnesses and local officials. In an interview with the Pakistan Tribune, two witnesses said that after the initial gunfire, soldiers approached one of the wounded Afghans and shot him dead at close range.

“They did it on purpose, I think,” said Muhammad Ismail, the brother of one of those killed. Witnesses believe the shooters were Special Forces soldiers, but that couldn’t be confirmed.

The incident prompted a demonstration and shouts of “Death to America.”

The deaths could stir up animosity in the area, a strategic region bordering Iran.