Editor
19th June 2002, 17:51
Misery is Faded Out
Afghanistan: While Loja Jirga is celebrated, thousands are threatened by starvation.
By Rainer Rupp
Prominent politicians of the "western value community" all praised themselves after the large meeting of the council in Afghanistan for saving the country's democracy and free-market economy and helping human rights break through by driving out the Taliban. They and the corporate media carefully avoid letting information about hunger and diseases in the country become public, especially if the misery was caused by the USA. So it is not surprising that in the German media as well there has been absolutely nothing about the events of Thursday last week, when a group of more than 1000 Afghan refugees' desperate fight for its survival became public. They had left their homeland last year when the Americans began to destroy the southern Afghan provinces with their bombs.
The 1120 American bomb victims, currently in the refugee camp Rabata e Alam Islami in the proximity of Spin Boldak in south Afghanistan nearby the border of Pakistan, had gotten no food for weeks. After the daily water supplies were stolen for over one week, drinking water also became limited. Pashtun refugees from the north of Afghanistan are living in another of the five camps around Spin Boldak. They don't dare come back because of fear of attacks by the ruling Uzbeks, part of the Northern Alliance, allied with the USA, the old and new ruling powers in the country.
The lawlessness increased at the same time everywhere in the country again rapidly and has reached nearly the level of the time before the Taliban rule. Since particularly in the north of the country - thus in the direct sphere of influence of the Northern Alliance - assaults and encroachments on representatives of the international relief organizations are accumulating too, the relief organizations threatened to withdraw completely from this part of the country now several times.
Meanwhile the Loja Jirga is in danger of slipping into chaos. So far the delgegates can't agree on the makeup of the cabinet and parliament. After a speech by the chairman of the Loja Jirga things became tumultuous - the consultations have been postopned again.
First published by German newspaper Junge Welt (http://www.jungewelt.de).
http://www.jungewelt.de/2002/06-19/004.php
Translated using Babelfish (http://babelfish.altavista.com), revised, edited by Lindsay Neil.
(Edited by Editor at 10:10 pm on June 19, 2002)
Afghanistan: While Loja Jirga is celebrated, thousands are threatened by starvation.
By Rainer Rupp
Prominent politicians of the "western value community" all praised themselves after the large meeting of the council in Afghanistan for saving the country's democracy and free-market economy and helping human rights break through by driving out the Taliban. They and the corporate media carefully avoid letting information about hunger and diseases in the country become public, especially if the misery was caused by the USA. So it is not surprising that in the German media as well there has been absolutely nothing about the events of Thursday last week, when a group of more than 1000 Afghan refugees' desperate fight for its survival became public. They had left their homeland last year when the Americans began to destroy the southern Afghan provinces with their bombs.
The 1120 American bomb victims, currently in the refugee camp Rabata e Alam Islami in the proximity of Spin Boldak in south Afghanistan nearby the border of Pakistan, had gotten no food for weeks. After the daily water supplies were stolen for over one week, drinking water also became limited. Pashtun refugees from the north of Afghanistan are living in another of the five camps around Spin Boldak. They don't dare come back because of fear of attacks by the ruling Uzbeks, part of the Northern Alliance, allied with the USA, the old and new ruling powers in the country.
The lawlessness increased at the same time everywhere in the country again rapidly and has reached nearly the level of the time before the Taliban rule. Since particularly in the north of the country - thus in the direct sphere of influence of the Northern Alliance - assaults and encroachments on representatives of the international relief organizations are accumulating too, the relief organizations threatened to withdraw completely from this part of the country now several times.
Meanwhile the Loja Jirga is in danger of slipping into chaos. So far the delgegates can't agree on the makeup of the cabinet and parliament. After a speech by the chairman of the Loja Jirga things became tumultuous - the consultations have been postopned again.
First published by German newspaper Junge Welt (http://www.jungewelt.de).
http://www.jungewelt.de/2002/06-19/004.php
Translated using Babelfish (http://babelfish.altavista.com), revised, edited by Lindsay Neil.
(Edited by Editor at 10:10 pm on June 19, 2002)