Because of the international community's failure to provide sufficient security and financial assistance, Afghans are struggling against a resurgent Taliban movement, entrenched warlords, and severe poverty. Afghans have managed to progress despite these challenges, but they need real support, not just rhetoric. |
Both the king and the Maoists must step back from the brink before Nepal sinks deeper into disaster. |
It contains a barely veiled threat of collective punishment. Making such a threat is a violation of the Geneva conventions and other laws of war. |
Lots of Afghans are disappointed and cynical because they feel like people who perpetrated serious human rights abuses have been allowed back in the parliament. |
Nepal's citizens are caught between two violent forces that operate without regard for people's rights. Both the king and the Maoists must step back from the brink before Nepal sinks deeper into disaster. |
The Afghan people need a government that is functional and accountable. The warlords offer neither. |
The Afghan people need a government that is functional and accountable. The warlords offer neither. |
The London Conference should not be an occasion for celebratory backslapping, but for rolling up sleeves and making up for past weak performance. The gains made by Afghans are not sustainable without greater international support and commitment. |
The Maoists can voice their opposition to these elections, but that does not mean they are free to kill those who choose to participate. |
The real measure of security and development in Afghanistan is not the number of foreign troops, but whether people feel safe enough to go to the market, to travel at night to seek medical care, or to send their children to school. |
The success of the Conference should be judged by how much donors commit to do for the security and development of the Afghan people, not their own political agendas. The real measure of security and development in Afghanistan is not the number of foreign troops, but whether people feel safe enough to go to the market, to travel at night to seek medical care, or to send their children to school. |
The US detain people, keep them for a while and then release them without charges. It sometimes take two months for the family to know where the detainees are. |
The vigilantes operate completely outside the law, and this situation places civilians more deeply in the path of danger. |
The young people had been used as cooks, porters and medical personnel, but they had had military training and all were carrying grenades and socket bombs when they were picked up. |
There are several districts, particularly in southern Afghanistan, where the government doesn't even really exist. |