Patrick Cockburn, Middle East correspondent for The Independent, discusses the extreme poverty on display in Kabul despite the many NGOs and billions of dollars in aid spent since 2001; subcontracted rebuilding projects in dangerous and remote areas that are especially prone to fraud and waste; the Afghan government’s inextricable ties to the heroin trade; how the US squandered any goodwill remaining from overthrowing the Taliban; and how the US praises Afghan ‘democracy’ while ignoring the request of supposed-potentate Hamid Karzai to stop night raids.
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