Hanan Habibzai

US in denial: Watershed in Afghanistan Diplomatic statements have ignored the strategic and psychological battles won by the Taliban. Marwan Bishara The senior political analyst at Al Jazeera. Doha, Qatar - In one of the first official US reactions to the attacks against Kabul and cities across eastern Afghanistan last weekend, Ryan C Crocker, US ambassador to Afghanistan, said: "The Taliban are really good at issuing statements, Less good at actually fighting." And after accusing (or crediting) the Haqqani network based in the tribal area within the Afghan-Pakistan borders' region, the ambassador added: "Frankly I don't think the Taliban is good enough." These declarations have come after the insurgents targeted sensitive installations in the country's most important population centres - including at least three prominent targets in Kabul - in one of the most coordinated and pronounced assaults since the occupation bega...

By Nicole Colson    '' Source:  International.to News'' CHICAGO (IDN) - The U.S. war and occupation of Afghanistan was supposed to bring stability and democracy. Instead, Afghanistan remains a country on the brink of disaster – one that has clearly been exacerbated by the U.S. presence. More than 10 years after the U.S. war began, in spite of the presence of about 2,000 international aid groups, at least $3.5 billion in humanitarian funds and $58 billion in development assistance, humanitarian conditions in Afghanistan remain abysmal. This past winter, one of the harshest in recent years, compounded the suffering of those living in refugee camps – an estimated 35,000 people just in the capital of Kabul, and many more around the country. The camps, according to the New York Times , are euphemistically referred to as "informal settlements," because labeling them as what they really are, camps full of war refugees, is "politically se...