November 2011

November 21, 2011

A decade after the fall of Taliban rule 

Afghanistan has been much in the news, with the problems facing drought-affected areas of the country - aid groups say 14 of the country’s 34 provinces, most of them in the north, have been hit by the drought, believed to be one of the worst this decade - and the continuing violence and deaths both of Afghan civilians and soldiers and others caught up in conflict.

The 10th anniversary, on 7 October 2011, of the US invasion to oust Al Qaida and the Taliban followed soon after the assassination of former President Rabbani and the Taliban’s brazen attack on the US Embassy in Kabul in mid September. According to The Guardian, after 10 years “just over 2,750 foreign troops have been killed – 28% of them in Helmand – while between 14,000 and 18,000 civilians have died as a result of fighting, according to various estimates…”.

According to the BBC, nearly $300 billion has been spent between 2002 and 2009 on International Assistance - foreign military operations (84.6%), security and aid (9.4%). Statistics, awful though they are, tell only half the story.

The day after the US Embassy attack, I had this email from our General Manager, Samim: ‘Two suicide bomb blasts near to the AA premises at Kabul. Yesterday, four insurgent groups at four different areas attacked Kabul, two massive bomb blasts occurred near to our premises… We had 64 people present at work, young girls and boys, fathers and mothers of families. After the first bomb blast, it was very difficult… we consult each other on management team ... then took a decision to leave the trainees by separate groups and follow them until arriving home, this done very good and all arrived safe’.

Samim’s letter makes clear why our work in Afghanistan is so important – because the best alternative to violence and despair is to develop entrepreneurs, create jobs and businesses and provide good education and healthcare. That’s what we do in our Training & Business Incubation Centre in Kabul, where we train young people to weave carpets and, since starting 3 months ago, sew and make clothes.

In our last newsletter, we appealed for £3000 to help 6 of our trainees to take the next step towards creating sustainable carpet weaving businesses. We have now passed the £3000 mark, with pledges or donations totalling £3150. Thank you so much. Thank you too for the special orders we have been receiving for bespoke carpets – these provide the income our people need to grow their enterprises. We have appointed someone in Kabul to oversee the literacy and numeracy programme, ICT, English and business skills training.

Some very good news: we now have several carpet retailers we’re working with, including Nomads’ Tent (http://www.afghanaction.co.uk/index.php/nomadstent), Moss Furniture (http://www.mossfurniture.co.uk), and Oriental Rugs of Bath (http://www.orientalrugsofbath.com). Oriental Rugs of Bath have written to their customers and also those of you who are on our database, enclosing a simple postcard about our work and also describing their plans and ways of working with us.

On the clothing front, we have two orders from companies in Kabul and our initial 12 trainees are doing well. We’re working hard to expand these orders in the next few weeks and will soon need to expand our number of trainees.

Two final points. First,  John Fenn has kindly been running and cycling 5529 kilometres (equivalent to Afghanistan’s borderline) to raise money for Afghan Action. We are most grateful to him. And, secondly, we now belong to JustTextGiving. You can text AFGH11 £1, £2, £3, £4, £5 or £10 to 70070 to make a donation to Afghan Action if you’d like to.

Thank you for all your interest and support,

Chris Beales