The Killid Group website - News on Afghanistan reports analysis pictures cartoon

Silence around money shakes trust in NATO

news@tkg.af (Esmatullah Mayar) — Sun, 27 May 2012 05:55:28 +0000

NATO leaders meeting in Chicago agreed to an "irreversible" plan to pull out all troops by the end of 2014, but did not make specific commitments on money to Afghanistan's security forces. Killid gathered people's opinion throughout the country. Afghanistan has demanded NATO pay 4.1 billion USD annually to equip and fund the ANSF (Afghan National Security Forces) to wage the war it started. The US was spending roughly 2 billion USD a week last year.Mohamad Adel of Khak Jabar, Kabul, is confident the ANSF can defend the country if NATO keeps its promise to fund Afghan security ...

More female addicts as poppy production jumps

news@tkg.af (A. Malahat) — Sun, 27 May 2012 05:53:39 +0000

Alarm bells are ringing over the latest figures that show the number of female addicts in Kabul city has doubled in the last two years. Simultaneously poppy cultivation has increased to 61 percent in 2011, a jump of 7 percent from the previous year.Deputy Finance and Planning in the Ministry of Counter Narcotics engineer Ibrahim Azhar said according to calculations made by the UN Office on Drugs and Crime (UNODC) and his ministry, there are one million addicts in the country. However, the capacity for providing treatment in comparison to the number of addicts was a mere 1 ...

Iran expels Afghan workers

news@tkg.af (Qala Nawee) — Sun, 27 May 2012 05:51:11 +0000

Iran has stepped up the process of expelling illegal Afghan workers. Within the last months, 20,000 were deported from Iran, says the Department of Refugee Repatriation.Hameedullah Khateebi, the head of the department, says the Afghans are arrested by security forces and "expelled after passing a few nights in camps in Iran." The men who are often picked up at work, are forced to leave before they can even collect their wages, he adds.Some workers have said they have been in camps for more than 10 days before being dumped across the border by Iranian authorities.Zabihullah, 15, is ...

Exam to choose governor

news@tkg.af (Noor Agha Soltanif) — Sun, 27 May 2012 05:46:29 +0000

Three hundred and twenty people took the examination for the selection of district governors but none of them are hopeful of making it. Candidates say only those who have paid bribes and have contacts in the government will qualify.Independent Directorate of Local Governance (IDLG) Abdul Khaliq Farahi who would like the competition to be "fair and transparent" observes candidates who are chosen on the basis of their experience and aptitude would be able to tackle the mammoth task of Afghanistan's underdevelopment.The countrywide examination to select governors in the country's 57 ...

Hybrid seeds are importing dependence

news@tkg.af (Nematullah Taneen) — Sun, 20 May 2012 07:31:08 +0000

Tonnes of hybrid seeds are sold to farmers as the only way to raise yields. But results on the ground disappoint. A Killid investigation by Nematullah TaneenKhalilullah has been a farmer all his life. Like his neighbours in Gul Bagh, Kabul province, he sowed imported hybrid seeds distributed by the Ministry of Agriculture and harvested a mere 28 ser (1 ser is equal to 7 kg) of wheat. "Farmers of Gul Bagh did not get the promised yield," he asserts. "The improved seeds produced many times less than what we've got from the land in previous years."The farmer is disenchanted ...

Countdown to Chicago

news@tkg.af (Killid) — Sun, 20 May 2012 07:29:02 +0000

President Karzai will have to bargain hard at the NATO Chicago summit if he is to secure lasting peace. Hopes and expectations of the people are very high, Killid reporters say.The world's most powerful leaders are meeting on May 20 and 21 in Chicago, President Barack Obama's hometown, to discuss Afghanistan after 2014. President Hamid Karzai will be leading a delegation that will have to secure long-term funding and equipment for the Afghan National Security Forces (ANSF).In the run-up to the conference some of the likely obstacles were ironed out. On May 16 NATO sent an invitation to ...

Afghanistan in every breath

news@tkg.af (Killid) — Sun, 20 May 2012 07:27:01 +0000

Najibullah Musafer is one of the finest Afghan photographers. His photos have won many international awards. He says each time he accepts an award he receives it for his country. "I will breathe Afghanistan till my last breath!" Only 49 years old he grew up in Kol-e-Abchakan, Kabul. "I graduated from Sher Shah Suri high school in 1982," he says. Since he had always dreamed of being an artist he hoped to join the art school in Kabul University. But politics came in the way. "It was the time of Babrak Karmal - military service was compulsory; the government arrested ...

Media's money worries

news@tkg.af (Raheem Gul Nayel) — Sun, 20 May 2012 07:23:09 +0000

Independent media in Khost worries about the future after 2014Will international assistance to the media dry up after US and NATO forces hand over security to Afghans? Can the media, one of the country's biggest success stories of the last decade, survive without foreign aid?Both questions are the subject of much discussion in the independent media in Khost.Amanullah Haqmal, chief of Da Wolas Ghag (voice of the nation) told Killid that major contracts with aid agencies and international organisations have either lapsed or been recently terminated, creating a serious hole in the radio's ...

Against all odds, school stays open

news@tkg.af (Ismayeel Larwai) — Sun, 20 May 2012 06:33:18 +0000

Building in ruins, school shifts to a village house in Paktia.Hesarak village is in a remote part of Paktia province. Killid visited the village in Chamkani district to find its dedicated teachers were holding classes in rooms in a private home because the primary school building has not been rebuilt."I have divided the primary schoolchildren in three rooms of this house," said the teacher, Rahim Gul.He could not say why the primary school has no building. "They (provincial authorities) have allotted the land, the building for the school has also been approved but still the ...

Thumbs Up for pact with US

news@tkg.af (Nyamatullah Tanin) — Sun, 20 May 2012 06:31:14 +0000

Kabul residents have been calling the strategic agreement between Afghanistan and the US a new start in the history of the country.People say anxieties about an unknown/uncertain future after the departure of foreign forces in 2014 war have turned to hopes for a stable future.Sixteen-year-old Bashir, a student of Kabul Habibia High School, said: "My father was always saying that the war and killings could start again, but with the signing of the strategic agreement on May 2nd, my father's anxiety regarding the future has decreased."The student added, "I hope for peace in the ...