As everyone braces for a bloody summer, the new US administration has shaken up its top military command in Afghanistan. But is the
continued focus on the military intervention still too predominant?
The small but important improvements achieved in maternal mortality in Afghanistan over the past seven years are being threatened by increasing instability.
Kabul and Islamabad have taken an important step back from guiding the attempt at détente. Now it's up to the myriad others to take the nascent peace process forward.
Feryal Ali Gauhar's new novel is an unmitigated tale of horror – bestial fact stacked upon bestial fact, evoking revulsion and nausea. The book's jacket claims that
Five years of backward progress on securing the country now has NATO forces taking over security in Afghanistan. With few of the lessons of the past having sunk in, it appears unlikely that the country will breathe easier in the coming year.
Even though there is fear of electoral violence, even though parties are disallowed, even though this is an election organised to fit an international timetable, there is hope that the general elections of 18 September will give Afghans the politics of representation and deliver them from the gun.
