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June 19, 2008 :: RSS :: Print :: Email
Sky News: For many citizens of this, one of the poorest countries on the planet, life is still exceedingly tough and it is no exaggeration to say they have a daily struggle to survive. No jobs, no money and hope fading fast. "Afghanistan cannot be rebuilt with corrupt people," says Malalai Joya, expelled MP. "Our Government is undemocratic. We have a mafia system where drug lords and war lords are in power with the mask of democracy." Full news...
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June 14, 2008 :: RSS :: Print :: Email
The Associated Press: The girl was 11 when she was molested by a man with no legs. The man paid her $5. And that was how she started selling sex. Afghanistan is one of the world's most conservative countries, yet its sex trade appears to be thriving. Sex is sold most obviously at brothels full of women from China who serve both Afghans and foreigners. Far more controversial are Afghan prostitutes, who stay underground in a society that pretends they don't exist. Full news...
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June 13, 2008 :: RSS :: Print :: Email
The Globe and Mail: Since the repressive Taliban regime was toppled in late 2001, Afghanistan, which has one of the highest infant and maternal mortality rates in the world, has vastly improved health-care services for mothers and their babies. However, in restive regions in southern Afghanistan, such as rural areas in Kandahar and Helmand provinces, many women say the situation has worsened. Full news...
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June 7, 2008 :: RSS :: Print :: Email
PAN: More than six million children in the country face problems such as smuggling, abduction, performing harsh jobs and get no education. He said that all governmental organizations should pay serious attention to administer justice for children, make education available, make health services accessible, make better their financial conditions and prevent the smuggling of children. Full news...
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June 6, 2008 :: RSS :: Print :: Email
AFP: YEARS of war saw Afghanistan’s forests levelled and its land polluted with fuel and mines, while more recent unchecked building and urbanisation is heaping new pressure on the environment, officials say. Full news...
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June 6, 2008 :: RSS :: Print :: Email
On Line Opinion: The Afghan occupation is in its seventh year, and resistance to the occupation has not abated. According to the US National Intelligence director the US puppet regime of Hamid Karzai exerts control over no more than 30 per cent of the country. The situation for women has not improved since the US led invasion, in fact quite the contrary. Full news...
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June 2, 2008 :: RSS :: Print :: Email
BBC Persian: Thousands of villagers of the Balkh province in North Afghanistan have settled in a desert near the Sholgira River after losing their cattle and cultivating lands. These villagers have come to this river (which is in the south of Mazar-e-Sharif) in groups from the villages of Alabraz so that “at least they have access to water”. They have either come on foot or on their animals like donkeys. Full news...
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May 28, 2008 :: RSS :: Print :: Email
PAN: Not observing the pause between births, early marriages, not going to healthcare centers, being in contact with other diseases are the causes of increase in the number of women with tuberculosis in the country. According to the information of the Ministry of Public Health, last year about 40,000 women had this disease and about 8,500 of them died. 70% of the people with this disease were women. Full news...
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May 27, 2008 :: RSS :: Print :: Email
Reuters: The prevalence of HIV is low in Afghanistan, but the potential risk factors for the spread of the disease remain high, the Public Health Ministry said on Monday. "But ... war, poverty, illiteracy, massive international and external displacement, the high level of poppy cultivation, drug trafficking and usage, the existence of commercial and unsafe sex, unsafe injection practices and blood transfusion are potential risk factors for its spread," the ministry said. Full news...
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May 22, 2008 :: RSS :: Print :: Email
Toronto Star: Three decades of war, millions of mines and unexploded ordinance (UXO) for children to trip over, suicide bombers, birth defects due to clannish intermarriage, congenital disabilities never corrected for lack of health care, ordinary ailments left untreated and the vast afflicted detritus accrued from preventable diseases such as polio, to say nothing of inestimable psychological trauma: Afghanistan is a wasteland of the mutilated and crippled. Full news...
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May 19, 2008 :: RSS :: Print :: Email
Reuters: When 19-year-old Fatima returned to her home in northern Afghanistan after years as a refugee in Iran, she struggled desperately to earn a living. She briefly found work with an NGO, before being let go, and then spent two months learning how to weave carpets, before the factory shut down and she was again out on the streets of Mazar-i-Sharif. Full news...
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May 15, 2008 :: RSS :: Print :: Email
Times Online: It is an unremarkable scene by Afghan standards – at first sight, just another sad monument to three decades of war. Yet this desolate, seemingly hopeless, place is the source of Afghanistan’s most recent chapter of violence – and possibly now of a brighter economic future. Full news...
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May 14, 2008 :: RSS :: Print :: Email
IRIN News: The killing and abduction of dozens of health workers in the past two years has prompted officials to shut down at least 36 health facilities in Afghanistan’s volatile southern and eastern provinces, depriving hundreds of thousands of people of basic health services, according to the Ministry of Public Health (MoPH). Full news...
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April 30, 2008 :: RSS :: Print :: Email
One Planet, BBC World Service: Doctors in Afghanistan say rates of some health problems affecting children have doubled in the last two years. Some scientists say the rise is linked to use of weapons containing depleted uranium (DU) by the US-led coalition that invaded the country in 2001. Full news...
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April 30, 2008 :: RSS :: Print :: Email
Reuters: About 1,600 Afghan women die in childbirth out of every 100,000 live births. In some of the most remote areas, the death rate is as high as 6,500. In comparison, the average rate in developing countries is 450 and in developed countries it is 9. Virtually everyone in Afghanistan can recount a story about a relative dying in childbirth, often from minor complications that can be easily treated with proper medical care. Full news...
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April 28, 2008 :: RSS :: Print :: Email
Reuters: Badakhshan, bordering Tajikistan to the north, is far from the fighting with Taliban insurgents in the south, but is still one of Afghanistan's poorest provinces. Those that fare worst live in the mountains where they are snowed in for up to six months of the year. In outlying districts such as Raghistan, Kohistan and Darwaz, there is little cultivable land and people survive on mulberries and other types of wild food, aid workers say. Full news...
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March 5, 2008 :: RSS :: Print :: Email
IRIN News: Saliha still mourns the death of her three-year-old daughter, Halima, who died due to severe diarrhoea at a hospital in Kunar Province, eastern Afghanistan, on 11 January. The child had drunk contaminated water which Saliha's family collects from a nearby river and uses for all purposes, including drinking, cooking and washing. Full news...
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October 30, 2007 :: RSS :: Print :: Email
IRIN News: The Safi fur and wool factory, in Herat city, western Afghanistan, has more than 350 female and 300 male workers who earn only 300 Afghanis (US$6) for their 48-hour, six-day week. The factory produces coats, jackets, hats and other garments for the European and North American markets. There are more than 1,500 women working in four such factories in Herat city. Full news...
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July 19, 2007 :: RSS :: Print :: Email
IRIN News: Flooding, armed conflict and population displacements are factors likely to increase malaria cases in Afghanistan this year, public health officials warn. "In 14 high-risk provinces the number of malaria patients will surpass that of 2006," Abdulwase Ashaa, director of the national anti-malaria department, told IRIN on 19 July in Kabul. Full news...