Another 16 French soldiers were injured, some seriously, in the incident in Kapisa province.

An official told the BBC that an Afghan non-commissioned officer got into a “verbal clash” and opened fire.

President Nicolas Sarkozy said France was suspending its training programs in Afghanistan following the attack.

Marco Werman talks with the BBC’s Bilal Sarwary in Kabul.

Read the Transcript
The text below is a phonetic transcript of a radio story broadcast by PRI’s THE WORLD. It has been created on deadline by a contractor for PRI. The transcript is included here to facilitate internet searches for audio content. Please report any transcribing errors to theworld@pri.org. This transcript may not be in its final form, and it may be updated. Please be aware that the authoritative record of material distributed by PRI’s THE WORLD is the program audio.

Marco Werman: I’m Marco Werman, this is The World. There was an incident today in Afghanistan that highlights a growing problem for US troops and their allies there. A soldier of the Afghan National Army opened fire on a group of French military trainers. Four French soldiers were killed and at least 16 more were injured. In Paris, French President Nicolas Sarkozy reacted by saying French troops are not in Afghanistan to be shot at by their allies.

Nicolas Sarkozy: [Speaking French] We are the Afghan people’s friend and we are the Afghan people’s allies, but I can’t accept that Afghan soldiers could fire on French soldiers. If the security conditions are not clearly established then the question of an anticipated withdrawal of the French Army will be raised.

Werman: This is not the first time an Afghan soldier has fired on allied foreign troops. The BBC’s Bilal Sarwary is in Kabul. What’s known about this soldier, this Afghan soldier and his motives, Bilal, and the circumstances under which his attack on the French soldiers took place?

Bilal Sarwary: Well, we do know that he is a noncommissioned officer with the Afghan National Army, and that he had a verbal clash. Soon afterwards he fired at the French, killing 4 and injuring 17 others. The Afghan Minister of Defense here in Kabul has sent a delegation to find out more, but we do understand that the Afghan National Security Forces, the French soldiers serving with NATO, the International Security Assistance Force, were conducting a huge clearance operation in what is known as a volatile region.

Werman: This is not the first time this has happened where an Afghan soldier or policeman kills foreign troops inside Afghanistan. Do you know how many coalition troops have been killed by Afghan forces in this manner?

Sarwary: I don’t have an exact number, but I know enough to say that this is a very grave problem, one which has created deep mistrust between the Afghans and the international forces.

Werman: Any sense of why it’s happening now?

Sarwary: Well, it’s very difficult to say why, but I’ve followed the case of one Afghan rogue soldier who killed six US Special Forces. In this case he was recruited for 3-1/2 years by the Taliban. His uncles were leading the insurgency in that region, and the Afghan government totally failed in terms of counter intelligence to really understand that this was no more an Afghan border policeman, but a Taliban infiltrator. And it’s really difficult to have intelligence on people who come from areas where the Afghan government is simply not there. What is really ironic is that a lot of the Afghan National Army and police soldiers have Taliban hypnotic chants as their ringtones on their mobile phones…

Werman: Really.

Sarwary: including those serving on joint Afghan international bases I have come cross in the eastern province of Nangarhar, I saw it in Kandahar last week. If you listen to those hypnotic chants, if you listen to those Taliban songs with their music, they really prey on the most basic emotion of an Afghan. And a lot of those people who come to the Afghan Security Forces come from the country’s royal areas with no education and with areas where the Afghan government has never been there. The second big problem that seems to be there is the issue of cultural differences. For example, when I was in the eastern province of Nangarhar I went to an Afghan border police training center where the Americans were training the Afghans. And the problem there was that the Americans were absolutely disgusted in their own words, tired and frustrated that the Afghans were taking hours for their lunch, prayer and tea breaks. And according to the Americans the Afghans there were simply lazy, they were not working hard. Now, if you went to the Afghans in the same camp they would have told you the Americans are using the F-word, they’re not allowing us to pray, they’re not allowing us to eat, so both sides were involved in a tit for tat sort of war.

Werman: Well, thanks very much for the update. The BBC’s Bilal Sarwary in Kabul.

Copyright ©2009 PRI’s THE WORLD. All rights reserved. No quotes from the materials contained herein may be used in any media without attribution to PRI’s THE WORLD. This transcript may not be reproduced, in whole or in part, without prior written permission. For further information, please email The World’s Permissions Coordinator at theworld@pri.org.

“After 10 years in the wilderness, I would expect more than a few of them would like to try something different,” Crocker told host Marco Werman from the US Embassy in Kabul.

Crocker’s optimism comes despite roadblocks to the negotiations thrown up by Pakistan. Officials in Islamabad on Wednesday turned down a request by U.S. special envoy Marc Grossman to visit Pakistan. Grossman, the special representative on Afghanistan and Pakistan is handling the reconciliation effort. Relations between Islamabad and Washington have been especially tense since a NATO cross-border air attack killed 24 Pakistani soldiers on Nov. 26.

Many analysts are skeptical that the talks can move forward without Pakistan’s approval.

Crocker told Werman that sitting down with the Taliban does not mean giving in to their demands.

” This is hardly conceding the field to the enemy. It’s going to require an adversary to make some pretty tough choices as to whether they want to be part of a new Afghan society on Afghan government terms,” Crocker said.

The Taliban ruled Afghanistan from 1996 until 2001. American troops toppled the Sunni Islamist group after the September 11th attacks.

Read the Transcript
The text below is a phonetic transcript of a radio story broadcast by PRI’s THE WORLD. It has been created on deadline by a contractor for PRI. The transcript is included here to facilitate internet searches for audio content. Please report any transcribing errors to theworld@pri.org. This transcript may not be in its final form, and it may be updated. Please be aware that the authoritative record of material distributed by PRI’s THE WORLD is the program audio.

Marco Werman: Next door to Pakistan the war in Afghanistan grind on. The US is trying to jump start negotiations with the Taliban in an effort to start winding down the conflict. Pakistan could help given its reported links with the Taliban, that’s what US Special Envoy, Marc Grossman, wanted to discuss with officials in Islamabad. It’s his job to bring all the factions to the table, but as we noted earlier, Pakistan refused Grossman’s visit today. Still, the effort continues. The American Ambassador in Kabul, Ryan Crocker, says if the talks happen, Afghan officials will have to be at the forefront.

Ryan Crocker: Any process we’re gonna be involved in has to be one that is Afghan lead and aims at a reconciliation between the Afghan Taliban and the Afghan government.

Werman: Right, I keep hearing American officials say that Afghans have to lead this process in any negotiations with the Taliban. What is the evidence that Afghans are pushing on that front?

Crocker: Well, they’re very engaged, doing a lot of work, have a clear vision of where they want to see this go. So they are ready to lead, there’s no question in my mind. Marc Grossman will be visiting here, will be meeting with President Karzai and members of his team, basically to learn from them and him how they want to proceed with respect to any useful role we might play. This is their initiative. They’ll make decisions. They’ll decide how they run it and they’ll decide who they want in the room.

Werman: Now, Pakistan has actually said today that because of consternation over drone strikes that that visit with Marc Grossman is going to have to be delayed. Does that concern you?

Crocker: Well, clearly we’ve gone through a rough patch with Pakistan over the last couple of months, and they’ve got a whole range of internal problems of their own. I think these are nonetheless very important relationships between us and Pakistan, between us and Afghanistan, and between Afghanistan and Pakistan. So, clearly, there are problems. I think equally clearly the interests of all three countries are of such significance that we’ve gotta find a way to talk about them.

Werman: Could negotiations with the Taliban happen without Pakistan?

Crocker: Well, we’ll just have to see how it unfolds. Clearly, Pakistan is in a position to make the process easier or to make it more difficult, but I don’t think they can completely block it.

Werman: I mean the Pakistani military has been so closely tied to the Taliban and insurgents, it’s hard to imagine them letting the Taliban negotiate with complete independence.

Crocker: The Taliban of course are our adversary as they are the adversary of the Afghan government, but they are also Afghans. And you know, after 10 years in the wilderness I would expect that more than a few of them would like to try something different and see if they can come to terms.

Werman: What have you seen on the ground lately that’s given you the most encouragement that things may be headed in the right direction in Afghanistan?

Crocker: Well, I think there are a lot of encouraging signs. One of them, a lot of people would consider a negative, horrendous traffic in Kabul. They may exceed Cairo for world record traffic jams. The level of violence in Kabul is very, very low. When you’re out and about it’s a normal city; stores are open, people are on the streets, you know, there are art galleries, one feels very comfortable driving around again, as long as you can fight your way through the traffic.

Werman: Do you think Kabul would still have that vibrant quality if the US were to pull out today?

Crocker: Well, bare in mind the city of Kabul transitioned to Afghan security control in the summer. It’s Afghan security forces exclusively that are keeping the peace in the city and doing so effectively. When there have been incidents it has been those same Afghan forces that have resolved them. You know, Kabul is already totally in Afghan hands for security purposed.

Werman: Ambassador Crocker, explain something to me and my listeners, I mean wasn’t the goal in Afghanistan to keep it from becoming a safe haven for al-Qaeda and its allies, that would be the Taliban for one; and keeping the Taliban from ever returning to power? And by negotiating with the enemy isn’t the US admitting that the goal can’t be met?

Crocker: Actually, I would see it in completely contrary terms, Marco. Insurgencies normally end through some kind of political settlement. The terms the Afghan government has set for reconciliation, which we fully support, set the bar quite high. There has to be a complete break by the Taliban with al-Qaeda, a complete renunciation and sensation of violence, and respect by the Taliban for the Afghan constitution, including its protections for women and minorities. So this is hardly conceding the field to the enemy. It’s going to require an adversary to make some pretty tough choices whether they want to be part of the new Afghan society on Afghan government terms or not.

Werman: Ryan Crocker, the US Ambassador to Afghanistan, speaking with us from Kabul. Thank you very much indeed, Ambassador.

Crocker: Thank you.

Copyright ©2009 PRI’s THE WORLD. All rights reserved. No quotes from the materials contained herein may be used in any media without attribution to PRI’s THE WORLD. This transcript may not be reproduced, in whole or in part, without prior written permission. For further information, please email The World’s Permissions Coordinator at theworld@pri.org.

The Marine officers named a lead investigative officer in the case Friday.

All four Marines seen in the video have now reportedly been identified.

US officials, including Defense Secretary Leon Panetta, are worried that anger over the incident could undermine the US military effort in Afghanistan.

Anchor Marco Werman talks to Prof. Morris Davis of Howard University School of Law about the rules US service members are required to follow when it comes to enemy dead on the battlefield.

Marco Werman: I’m Marco Werman and this is The World, a co-production of the BBC World Service, PRI and WGBH Boston. The Pentagon is following through on its promise to quickly investigate that infamous video, the one of four marines apparently urinating on dead Taliban fighters. Today the Marine Corps officially named a lead investigative officer in the case, and all four marines seen in the video have now reportedly been identified. U.S. officials, including Defense Secretary, Leon Panetta, are worried that anger over the incident could undermine the U.S. military effort in Afghanistan. Fawzia Kofi, a member of the Afghan parliament is worried too.

Fawzia Kofi: Our deviated Taliban, and the utilities, and links to Taliban are looking for an excuse to use against intermission forces in Afghanistan. This could be good propaganda means.

Werman: A swift US investigation could help counter the negative image created by the incident. But, the Afghan government wants more than that. According to Afghan Foreign Ministry spokesman, Janan Mosazai.

Janan Mosazai: Our expectation is that an economist will conduct a thorough investigation into this incident, and punish all of those soldiers found to have been part of this reprehensible crime, and that they will be punished accordingly.

Werman: So what sort of legal charges could the four Marines involved be facing? Morris Davis is a retired Air Force colonel. He served as chief prosecutor at the U.S. prison at Guantanamo Bay, Cuba, from 2005 to 2007. He resigned from that post in 2008, and now teaches at Howard University School of Law. Colonel Davis, article 15 of the First Geneva Convention of 1864 prohibits the delivered mistreatment of a body on the battlefield. It appears that in this particular case in Afghanistan, the soldiers did not abide by the Geneva Convention. Would that be where the legal case starts?

Morris Davis: It could, but if you recall when we started the war in Afghanistan, the Bush administration said the Geneva Conventions didn’t apply. The Supreme Court disagreed in the Hamdan decisions, said Common Article 3 applies, but regardless, customary international humanitarian law recognizes that mistreating a corpse is prohibited.

Werman: And what are the guidelines for how you treat corpses in battle?
Davis: Well, there aren’t detail-specific guidelines other than the Geneva Conventions that talk about showing respect for the treatment of the dead body. I mean, there are certain things you would assume don’t need to be written down for most reasonable human beings to understand you don’t do, and certainly the behavior depicted in the video falls well below that standard.

Werman: This is not the first time we’ve heard of such an instance in Afghanistan; it also happened in Iraq. I’m also reminded of stories of American soldiers in Vietnam taking body parts as souvenirs. Can you help us understand how the generally accepted rules of war can fall by the wayside on the battlefield when it comes to the dead?

Davis: Some people have a hard time grasping that there are rules that apply to war. I mean, I think some people assume that if the situation reached a point where war is broken out, then it’s “anything goes”. And that’s one of the arguments that you hear now, is “look at how the Taliban behaves”. But, we don’t gage our conduct by the conduct of our adversaries. And there are certainly, as you mentioned, exceptions from Iraq and from Vietnam, and from World War II. But that doesn’t change the fact of the matter, that we pride ourselves, the military, for our professionalism and living up to a higher standard than our adversaries.

Werman: How psychically difficult do you think it is to treat the dead with respect when you’re in the midst of war and there’s bullets flying all over? Is it too much to ask of troops?

Davis: I don’t think it is; I mean, I think it’s basic human dignity not to mistreat the dead. I mean, the law of war permits conduct that in normal circumstances would not be permitted, for instance, killing. But, once the enemy is no longer capable of fighting, whether they’re sick, wounded, captured or killed, then you lose the right to do things that you ordinarily couldn’t do. And certainly, in this video, if it is what it appears to be, then our soldiers, their conduct fell below the standards that are acceptable.

Werman: Colonel Davis, when the rules of war are not followed, where do you place the blame? On the troops themselves or is this a leadership problem?

Davis: I think accountability and responsibility should be throughout the process. I mean, certainly there’s no excusing what’s depicted in the video. So that’s kind of the bottom of the pyramid, but at the top of the pyramid, when we started out this war in Afghanistan, the Bush administration said the Geneva Conventions were quaint and didn’t apply. Basically, “take your gloves off and anything goes”. So, there should be some accountability at the top too for creating this atmosphere that allows this kind of behavior to occur. I mean, it’s certainly a lack of leadership to create an environment where any troop would think that this behavior is acceptable for a member of the U.S. armed forces.

Werman: It sounds like you take it back to that statement from the Bush administration that the Geneva Conventions don’t apply. Do you think that things started there?

Davis: Without a doubt in my mind. You know, America for 200 years, we viewed ourselves as the city on the hill that others should emulate and live up to. We still serve as an example, but often we serve as a bad example, not a good one. So, I think in this instance, the Pentagon is taking it seriously; I think the people will be held accountable, and hopefully this kind of behavior will continue to be the very rare exception and not the rule.
Werman: Retired Air Force Colonel Morris Davis recently served as executive director at the Crimes of War Education Project in Washington, D.C., where he worked to enhance global public awareness of international humanitarian law, and to highlight violations of the laws of war. He’s currently teaching at Howard University School of Law. Colonel Davis, thank you very much for your point of view.

Davis: Thank you.

Photojournalist David Gill is the Creative Director of a multimedia company based in Kabul.

He has been there for more than three years now and has dedicated his time to profiling interesting characters in the city.

He has captured in his images, men and women who make Kabul work.

He has profiled all kinds of interesting people like a sweet-maker, whom he calls the ‘Willy Wonka’ of Afghanistan and the first female Army general of Afghanistan or the child prodigy who wants to be like Arnie and one day make it big in Bollywood or even Hollywood.

Read the Transcript
The text below is a phonetic transcript of a radio story broadcast by PRI’s THE WORLD. It has been created on deadline by a contractor for PRI. The transcript is included here to facilitate internet searches for audio content. Please report any transcribing errors to theworld@pri.org. This transcript may not be in its final form, and it may be updated. Please be aware that the authoritative record of material distributed by PRI’s THE WORLD is the program audio.

Marco Werman: If Guantanamo conjures thoughts of a war in Afghanistan, here is something to remind us that the country is much more than that. David Gill has lived in the Afghan capital for more than three years. He’s director of a multi-media company there. And he’s made it his mission, through photos and videos, to profile Kabul’s everyday characters, the people who keep the city going. His project is called “Kabul, a city at work.” Gill says he took inspiration from the book Working by Studs Terkel. Gill has documented the daily routines of more than a hundred people, everyone from the postman to the candy maker at the local sweet shop.

David Gill: The sweet maker himself, when you walk in there, it’s like it’s been lit by Hollywood. There’s a massive hole in the roof, there’s a beautiful burning furnace, and the dirt all over his face, the fire and the smoke and the children — it’s almost cinematic. So you almost don’t have to do anything, just film the guy. He’s melting boiling pots of sugar and it’s like, “Come here and have a cup of tea” and watch this guy working.

Werman: His headline, the quote is brilliant: “Life under the Taliban was much better. There were no Snickers bars.” Is he saying that he has more competition now and he doesn’t like that?

Gill: Well, it was more about the price of sugar and cheap imports and everything else. I think if you ask anybody, there’s always some that think that life was better under the Taliban. I don’t think anybody wanted the Taliban to return, it’s just he is now in competition with the rest of the world. Before, it was kind of like an isolated country.

Werman: What is is for you about common workers? I think a lot of people here in the U.S. think of the people in Kabul may work as politicians or soldiers or aid workers. For you it seems like a completely different paradigm.

Gill: The paradigm came from convincing the rest of my family, mainly. My grandma — she’s 94 years old and she’s like, why are you living in a war zone? What are you doing there? It must be so dangerous. And I’m going, It’s not dangerous at all. It’s just a city that has violence, there are random explosions, but day-to-day life in Kabul is very normal. I pitched this story to Esquire magazine and they basically said give us some characters. Tell us who you want to write about. I started doing this list and it just got bigger and bigger.

Werman: Tell us about a couple of more people you spoke with, David, that you met.

Gill: WE divided the city into ten different areas. We’ve got a new dynamic, the new kids on the block, the filmmakers, the graffiti artists, the do-metal merchants. There’s all these kind of young people finding their own way. We’ve got the civil servants. We’ve got a postman here, a guy who delivers post every day and we don’t even have street addresses. My own house is known as Mad Dog House – Red Door, and that’s how you identify it to taxi companies. So you’ve got all these different areas and different categories.

Werman: There’s also the ice cream salesman who goes around Kabul with his rolling red plastic cart. It kind of looks like a giant stroller. What’s he like? What’s his job like?

Gill: I think it’s the sound of Kabul and if you were going to cover Kabul as a video maker or film maker, there are noises that you get in Kabul and it’s usually the sound of military helicopters or building. Or in the background of very single shot is “Cut!” because there’s an ice cream van going past and he’s playing the sound of Titanic on his portable ice cream machine. So you have to be in the project because he’s almost in every single video I’ve ever made.

Werman: Well, here’s the sound of his cart. Let’s have a listen.

Gill: Oh no, don’t do this to me.

Werman: Alright, it may not be so evident, but it is “My Heart Will Go On” from the movie Titanic. David, let’s end by talking about Qasem Foushanji, , who is a rock musician. He started a band in a style he describes as Afghanized metal. His music is pretty dark. Let’s take a listen.

Musician: The fear of sudden death is always there. From suicide ____ bombs. It’s like you go to some ministry or some embassy around 8 o’clock in the morning and you don’t know what’s going to happen.

Gill: Qasem Foushanji, he’s the lead singer for this metal band called District Unknown. He was massively affected by the 2008 Indian embassy bombing because he was in the queue outside. He saw many people die. So he decided to try to express himself through music, through art. Which he would never have been able to do during the Taliban.

Werman: It’s interesting, with the case of Qasem we come full circle after hearing the stories about people with these regular jobs that we kind of don’t think about. Here we are with somebody who was clearly affected by what is going on with the violence all over Afghanistan.

Gill: I think everybody is affected by it. Thirty years of war — it’s a cliche. Thirty years of instability. There’s a huge amount of post-traumatic stress disorder, which is not even recognized really. Everyone has a tale to tell.Qasem himself, who is a refugee, and pretty much all of the young population here, had to flee the country.And now they’re returning and trying to rediscover themselves and rediscover the city, just by telling the tale of the city. Trying to bring some history, bring some pride back to the place.

Werman: Photojournalist, videographer and blogger David Gill in Kabul. Thanks for telling us about these residents of Kabul who you’ve met.

Gill: It’s my pleasure.

Werman: You can see some of David Gill’s photos and videos of “Kabul a city at work.” They’re at theworld.org

Copyright ©2009 PRI’s THE WORLD. All rights reserved. No quotes from the materials contained herein may be used in any media without attribution to PRI’s THE WORLD. This transcript may not be reproduced, in whole or in part, without prior written permission. For further information, please email The World’s Permissions Coordinator at theworld@pri.org.

"The Sweet Maker" (Photo: David Gill)

"Female Army General" (Photo: David Gill)

"Child Prodigy" (Photo: David Gill)

Click on the images to see their stories

Gill says he took inspiration from the book “Working” by Studs Terkel. His work, which includes photographs and films in first-person narrative, is documented as Kabul: A City At Work.

Anchor Marco Werman spoke to David Gill to get more details about his work.

A statement confirmed the move, which has been backed by Afghan President Hamid Karzai.

Marco Werman talks to David Roberts of the Royal United Services Institute in Qatar about the proposed Taliban office.

Read the Transcript
The text below is a phonetic transcript of a radio story broadcast by PRI’s THE WORLD. It has been created on deadline by a contractor for PRI. The transcript is included here to facilitate internet searches for audio content. Please report any transcribing errors to theworld@pri.org. This transcript may not be in its final form, and it may be updated. Please be aware that the authoritative record of material distributed by PRI’s THE WORLD is the program audio.

Marco Werman: I’m Marco Werman, this is The World. Afghanistan today officially welcomed peace talks between the United States and the Taliban. It also welcomed the proposed opening of a Taliban office in the Gulf Emirate of Qatar. US and Afghan officials hope the new office will help hasten the end of the war in Afghanistan. Officials in Qatar lead by the country’s monarch may be relishing the fact that they get to play the role of matchmaker in any deal. Qatar, which is home to the Al Jazeera news network has worked hard to increase its influence in the region. David Roberts is with the Royal United Services Institute, a British think tank. He’s based in Doha, the capital of Qatar. Roberts says the opening of a Taliban office there makes a certain amount of sense.

David Roberts: Qatar has been involved for a little while now with America and Germany specifically, to try to I suppose engineer some kind of a resolution to some degree. And to be perfectly honest it makes a lot of sense. It doesn’t come as a surprise to me that this has happened here. Qatar has a quite long and illustrious history in recent years of trying to help with mediating in various conflicts.

Werman: Well, we’ll get to that in recent history, but as far as the Taliban, what does it mean to have an office in Qatar? I mean in my mind I see Taliban headquarters on the door of the office. What kind of physical profile will this office actually have?

Roberts: Yeah, indeed, I’m curious about that myself. I confess I don’t know. I don’t think anyone does to be perfectly honest. A lot of the way things work in Qatar are pretty ad hoc, no one knows specifically what the form will be. But in terms of the use of the office, I mean if we look at a couple of recent attempts to get some kind of negotiation going in Afghanistan, in September last year an Afghan government mediator was assassinated because he couldn’t find the right Taliban person to speak to. And the year before the American was fined several hundred thousands dollars for pretty much the same reason. So with the office here it’ll provide a bona fide represents to the Taliban, which it’s a very small step, but a crucial one.

Werman: As you say David, I mean this is the latest of several efforts by Qatar. It’s made efforts to try and broker deals in Syria, and Darfur and Sudan, on and off in Yemen. It sent four of its Mirage jets to the no-fly zone over Libya. Now this business with the Taliban. Why is Qatar stepping forward internationally?

Roberts: To some degree it’s because it can. It’s a very small state. It’s a threat to no one. It’s completely secured by America, it has two huge bases here, so it’s sort of intrinsically able to do this. The last point on that idea is obviously it’s a very small place as I say; if the mayor or the prime minister who’s very emboldened here, if they have an idea that they want to push forward no one in the bureaucracy will stop them at all. So it’s quite personalized in that way. And in recent years the elite have obviously had this desire to mediate in conflicts around the region. And if I could just mention Qatar and Darfur, they’ve been involved there for many years now to affect some kind of a resolution there. So why they’re doing this, yes, I think we can mention some altruistic reasons perhaps, but let’s not forget that Sudan is the bread basket of Africa as it’s known. Qatar is a very food insecure country. And obviously with all these years of negotiations they’ve built up a huge amount of goodwill in the country, not to mention a huge raft of contacts. So in that specific example we can see other reasons afoot shall we say. And you know, we can’t go through all the examples, but there are always multiple reasons essentially for this.

Werman: David Roberts, the deputy director of the Qatar office of the Royal United Services Institute. He joined us from the capital, Doha. Thank you very much indeed.

Roberts: Thank you.

Copyright ©2009 PRI’s THE WORLD. All rights reserved. No quotes from the materials contained herein may be used in any media without attribution to PRI’s THE WORLD. This transcript may not be reproduced, in whole or in part, without prior written permission. For further information, please email The World’s Permissions Coordinator at theworld@pri.org.

During his recent deployment to Afghanistan, Ty brought his one-man Shakespeare show to troops in Kabul.

Read the Transcript
The text below is a phonetic transcript of a radio story broadcast by PRI’s THE WORLD. It has been created on deadline by a contractor for PRI. The transcript is included here to facilitate internet searches for audio content. Please report any transcribing errors to theworld@pri.org. This transcript may not be in its final form, and it may be updated. Please be aware that the authoritative record of material distributed by PRI’s THE WORLD is the program audio.

Lisa Mullins: I’m Lisa Mullins and this is The World. Tyrus Lemerande recently returned home to Massachusetts. He’d been in Afghanistan for a six month deployment. Lemerande is a Navy Reservist and he was serving as a public affairs officer in Kabul. But Lemerande is also an actor and he put on one-man Shakespeare shows in Kabul. Back home, he and his wife, Amy McLaughlin, run the Knighthorse Theatre Company in Massachusetts. They bring Shakespeare to audiences across the US. When Ty Lemerande got deployed to Afghanistan, Amy continued their tradition of performing free summer shows on Cape Cod, but they’d collaborate over Skype.

Tyrus Lemerande: It was not the most ideal conditions for rehearsing, but she would do Shakespearean lines for me and I’d be like well, you need to hit that verb a little bit more, or I think you need to go a little faster here. And so that was what we kinda did across the…maybe Amy could give you a bit of a sonnet because we picked this sonnet specifically because of my being deployed. What number’s the sonnet, 27?

Amy McLaughlin: I think it’s 27.

“Weary with toil, I haste me to my bed,
The dear repose for limbs with travel tired;
But then begins a journey in my head,
To work my mind, when body’s work’s expired:
For then my thoughts, from far where I abide,
Intend a zealous pilgrimage to thee,
And keep my drooping eyelids open wide,
Looking on darkness which the blind do see
Save that my soul’s imaginary sight
Presents thy shadow to my sightless view,
Which, like a jewel hung in ghastly night,
Makes black night beauteous and her old face new.
Lo! thus, by day my limbs, by night my mind,
For thee and for myself no quiet find.”

Mullins: And so that specifically was, you chose that because you, Ty, were in Afghanistan.

Lemerande: So far away, and it’s…

McLaughlin: It was my life, yeah.

Lemerande: One of the great things about Shakespeare’s sonnets of course, is that you can find ones that apply to your particular situation. And we just love that sonnet because it was about love separated, and about this person who goes to sleep at night and the only solace that they have are thoughts of their loved one who’s so far away. And so we thought it was a great way to start out Amy’s play. And so we were bound together even though we were separated by so many miles.

Mullins: So how about on your side then? You performed Shakespeare for the troops.

Lemerande: I did, I felt this connection to Amy because she was doing this monumental Herculean task back home, two shows by herself on the Cape while taking care of our two-year-old son. And so I thought you know, I have to do something to kind of connect with her and connect back with Shakespeare, and so I created this free Shakespeare. I came up with a poster and I hung it all over the base. And Amy sent me my costume. It’s this really cool piece because our particular telling of Hamlet is that Horatio, who of course, is the only character who’s alive at the end, Hamlet says to him at the end, “Draw they breath in pain to tell my story.” And so the whole play unfolds in Horatio’s memory. And of course, after 2-1/2 hours I’m drenched in sweat. And I didn’t know who was going to come to this particular performance. I put on there one night only, free Shakespeare, come and see it. And the show was going off at 8 o’clock and by 7:15 all the chairs were filled. A dozen different countries, we had generals, we had everyone down to the lowest sergeants and petty officers. So we had standing room only, about 300 people that came to watch Hamlet of all things in the middle of Afghanistan. It was one of the coolest experiences of my life. And we got a standing ovation at the end.

Mullins: We? Well, you had a lot of help, but it was you on stage.

Lemerande: That’s true. I tend to say “we” because everything that we do is Amy and I, so even though Amy wasn’t there with me I felt that she was because…

Mullins: It’s just so romantic. You’re holding your heart, I can see why Amy.

Lemerande: Well, I pictured her that night standing in the back with my boy. And to be Hamlet, and Horatio, and Claudius and Gertrude, and Ophelia, because I get to play the girls too, so it’s very fun when I get to play the girls.

Mullins: All right, so give us girl-boy, whomever.

Lemerande: This is the speech from Hamlet that made me fall in love with this play, when he says to Rosencrantz and Guildenstern after the play within the play when he realizes that Claudius is in fact guilty. And Rosencrantz and Guildenstern have been called back to try and find out why he’s acting so crazy. And he grabs a recorder from one of the players and he says, “Will you play upon this pipe?” And they say, “We cannot, my Lord.” He says, “Come, ’tis as easy as lying. Look you, these are the stops” and he points out the holes on the recorder. And Rosencrantz and Guildenstern both say, “But we know no touch of it, my Lord, we cannot.” And he says, “Why, look you now, how unworthy a thing you make of me! You would play upon me. You would seem to know my stops. You would pluck out the heart of my mystery. You would sound me from my lowest note to the top of my compass. And there is much music, excellent voice, in this little organ, yet cannot you make it speak? S’blood, do you think I am easier to be played on than a pipe? Call me what instrument you will, though you can fret me, yet you cannot play upon me.” I’ve always loved that bit.

Mullins: But what about, what is it about Hamlet that spoke to them or do you think you could’ve done anything?

Lemerande: It was interesting because the second show I did was called The Shakespeare on Demand, and I actually did anything. The night that we did it they asked for Henry V, for example, which is very, very popular with military audiences.

Mullins: How come?

Lemerande: The band of brothers speech, people know that phrase, they know band of brothers. They know Crispin’s Day, but they don’t know where it comes from. It comes from Henry V. And there’s this great passage when on Crispin’s Day when Henry and his men are confronted by a superior French force on a field outside of the Castle Agincourt, outnumber five to one, Henry rallies his hungry, sick and tired troops to victory simply by rousing them and making them believe in each other. And he says, “This day is called feast of Crispian…

For he to-day that sheds his blood with me
Shall be my brother; be he ne’er so vile,
This day shall gentle his condition:
And gentleman in England now a-bed
Shall think themselves accursed they were not here,
And hold their manhoods cheap whiles any speaks
That fought with us upon Saint Crispin’s day.”

And they scream and they go into battle, and they win. And I believe that they reason they won that day is because Henry got them to believe not in themselves, but in each other. And I think it resonates with men and women who are separated from their families, that tall they have are their brothers and sisters in arms to rely upon, to talk to, to confide in, to be with for six months, nine months, twelve months, however long it is, that idea of a band of brothers I think they understand it.

Mullins: The words “band of brothers,” did they come out differently for you because you were then stationed in Afghanistan?

Lemerande: Oh, of course, because those were my brothers, when I said we few, we happy few. I’m looking at this group of people who are sitting around me in uniform and literally from 12 different countries. And here they are all sharing in me, with me, this moment in time. And you learn as an actor to allow that emotion to come forward and to infuse those words with a special meaning that the audience feels, that symbiotic relationship between actor and audience is very special. It’s one of the reasons I love what I do.

Mullins: Ty and Amy, thank you.

McLaughlin: Thank you.

Lemerande: You’re very welcome, thank you very much for having us.

Copyright ©2009 PRI’s THE WORLD. All rights reserved. No quotes from the materials contained herein may be used in any media without attribution to PRI’s THE WORLD. This transcript may not be reproduced, in whole or in part, without prior written permission. For further information, please email The World’s Permissions Coordinator at theworld@pri.org.

The officials blamed the Taliban, who they said had accused the women of “moral deviation and adultery”.

The police said two men had been arrested in connection with the murder.

The attack was only 300m from the governor’s office in Ghazni city, which is on a list of places to be transferred to Afghan security control.

The incident happened on Thursday in the Khawaja Hakim area of Ghazni city, where the family lived.

Marco Werman talks with the BBC’s Orla Guerin in Kabul, Afghanistan, about reports that a woman and her daughter were stoned and then shot to death Thursday by the Taliban in the city of Ghazni.

Read the Transcript
The text below is a phonetic transcript of a radio story broadcast by PRI’s THE WORLD. It has been created on deadline by a contractor for PRI. The transcript is included here to facilitate internet searches for audio content. Please report any transcribing errors to theworld@pri.org. This transcript may not be in its final form, and it may be updated. Please be aware that the authoritative record of material distributed by PRI’s THE WORLD is the program audio.

Marco Werman: I am Marco Werman. This is The World. Ten years of war in Afghanistan have changed many things especially for women there. The Taliban who were ousted from power a decade ago were known for their brutal treatment of women who defied their strict rules. Improving the lives of Afghan women and girls was an often sided objective when the war started in 2001. So, it’s disheartening to hear this news from Afghanistan a decade later. A woman and her daughter were stoned and then shot dead by the Taliban in the central city of Ghazni. The BBC’s Orla Guerin is in Kabul and has the details.

Orla Guerin: At about 3:30 or 4:00 in the morning, local time on Thursday morning, local sources say that armed Taliban entered the home of this young widow and her daughter. The women were accused of adultery. They were dragged into the yard in front of their house bordering the street. Initially, they were stoned and subsequently they were shot to death. Now that information is coming to us from relatives and from medical sources who have seen the bodies. This attack took place just 300 meters from the office of the Police Chief and from adjoining offices of the Governor, and also of Afghanistan’s main intelligence agency. It’s an indication of how easy it is for the Taliban to strike in this city, and this is a city which is due to be handed back from NATO to Afghan control. But very clearly, the Afghan government is struggling to establish its authority there.

Werman: Why is it believed that it was the Taliban that carried this out and not some other extremist group?

Guerin: Well, Afghan intelligence sources are telling us it was a Taliban attack. There are Taliban fighters roaming freely on the edge of Ghazni city, and the Taliban have a very visible presence. There are Taliban songs playing on some of the local radio stations. The Taliban have their own shadow governor for the province; they have shadow judges. They control the main roads in Ghazni province. They impose taxes. They threaten girls who go to school. This is a province of 18 districts. We believe that only 7 of those districts are in government control.

Werman: It’s a shocking murder, more so that it was done by stoning. How frequent though are these kinds of killings of women these days, especially in such a manner that evokes the rule of the Taliban pre-2001 in Afghanistan?

Guerin: Well, we hear of these cases and some of them come to light, not all of them. In this instance, although the women were initially stoned, we understand from medical sources that they died as a result of gunshot wounds. There was another case relatively recently which caused a great deal of shock and distress here in Afghanistan. That was a young couple who, if fact, were stoned to death last August in Kunduz province. But, video footage and mobile phone footage of those killings came to light only in January, and were particularly gruesome and particularly distressing. A woman was, in that instance, also stoned but survived the stoning, survived 2 minutes of a violent attack of stoning and she was also shot by the Taliban at the end.

Werman: It’s just shocking that 10 years after the occupation of Afghanistan this is still going on.

Guerin: It’s still going on and it’s one of the great concerns for Afghan women activists because now, in the preparation for the exit of foreign forces and also in the attempts to reach a peace deal with the insurgents, they feel that whatever little fragile progress has been achieved here in the last 10 years that that could be rolled back. Women’s activists here will tell you that they feel the clock is ticking. Many of those women now figure that they are targets. One said to me recently that it’s something they joke about between themselves, that they may be hung when the Taliban come back. She said they have to make it a joke because the fear is so real. And the complaint you also hear from these women is that the Afghan government is not giving them adequate representation. They are still struggling to be adequately represented at the Bonn conference in Germany at which so much about the future of Afghanistan will be decided.

Werman: I mean, so many people are talking about the Taliban being a part of some kind of negotiation in the future. An incident like this just doesn’t seem like Afghan women, even being at the table, will mean that much.

Guerin: Well, it appears inevitable that the Taliban will be part of some kind of power-sharing formula here. Nobody is sure of when that arrangement will come into being or how long it’s going to take. But it’s certainly very clear that the Taliban cannot be cut out of the picture; that they are in control, as we speak, of significant parts of this country and in those areas, life for women today is very similar to the life they enjoyed 10 years ago. They can’t leave their homes, they can’t educate their daughters, they can’t work for a living and they dare not be seen outside without a male relative. So, there are parts of the country in which that has never changed. And people here who lived under the old Taliban regime and who remember it say they still have the nightmares and they have the fears that, in some form, it will return.

Werman: The BBC’s Orla Guerin speaking with us from Kabul. Thanks so much.

Guerin: No problem.

Copyright ©2009 PRI’s THE WORLD. All rights reserved. No quotes from the materials contained herein may be used in any media without attribution to PRI’s THE WORLD. This transcript may not be reproduced, in whole or in part, without prior written permission. For further information, please email The World’s Permissions Coordinator at theworld@pri.org.

Read the Transcript
The text below is a phonetic transcript of a radio story broadcast by PRI’s THE WORLD. It has been created on deadline by a contractor for PRI. The transcript is included here to facilitate internet searches for audio content. Please report any transcribing errors to theworld@pri.org. This transcript may not be in its final form, and it may be updated. Please be aware that the authoritative record of material distributed by PRI’s THE WORLD is the program audio.

Lisa Mullins: I am Lisa Mullins and this is The World, the co-production of the BBC World Service, PRI and WGBH in Boston. A top U.S. Commander in Afghanistan had tough words for Pakistan today. Lieutenant General Curtis Scaparrotti said the Pakistan troops simply look the other way when insurgents fire rockets from Pakistan against U.S. troops in Afghanistan. He also said the cross-border communications with the Pakistanis remained difficult or non-existent. For some time now, U.S. officials have been charging Pakistan with aiding the Taliban and other insurgents in Afghanistan. Sarah Chayes served as a special assistant to Admiral Mike Mullen. Admiral Mullen recently stepped down as Chairman of the Pentagon’s Joint Chiefs of Staff. Chayes says that efforts to broker peace in Afghanistan through negotiations with the Taliban are misguided. She says that’s because the Taliban are essentially a proxy force of Pakistan and its military intelligence agency.

Sarah Chayes: When we talk about insurgencies and via negotiations, the presumption in that kind of statement is that you’re talking to a genuinely indigenous group or force. Whereas, the leadership of the Taliban and Haqqani network are essentially proxies of the Pakistani Military Intelligence Agency. So, what you are going to arrive at by negotiating in this route – and this is exactly what the Military Intelligence Agency wants – is for them to determine the outcome of these negotiations.

Mullins: But also, do we even know what Afghanistan wants?

Chayes: There is such an effort to try to accommodate Pakistan, and how can we get Pakistan on board with the peace process, that we are forgetting that most Afghans do not want to be back under the heel of Pakistan. And a lot of those Afghans are busily re-arming and re-positioning themselves to fight against this. So, if you bend over too far backwards to accommodate Pakistan in some kind of a negotiated settlement, you are going to get civil war.

Mullins: Yes, but at the same time, how can you deal with the Taliban or anti-American forces in Afghanistan and not deal with the ISI and the Pakistani government? I mean, it’s really a duel tracks.

Chayes: It is. Yes, a dual track is how I would do it. I would say, “Look, negotiating with the Taliban in this context is really negotiating with the ISI by proxies.

Mullins: This is the Intelligence Service in Pakistan.

Chayes: That’s right, the Military Intelligence Service. Negotiating with Taliban or Haqqani leadership is in effect negotiating with Pakistani leadership by proxies. So let’s do it directly. Let’s have state-to-state negotiations between Kabul and Islamabad that would be facilitated either by a U.S. facilitator or another international kind of “babysitter” and let’s really lay out on the table what is it that Pakistan wants out of Afghanistan. And instead of them going through this tortuous, indirect route to obtain what they want, let’s get it out on the table. What can they reasonably request or aspire to from their neighbor and what is actually unreasonable?

Mullins: Sarah, you have worked with some of the highest ranking U.S. officials at the U.S. military including General David McKiernan and Stanley McChrystal. You’ve been working with them, helping to advise them about what is happening on the ground in Afghanistan, what’s going on with Pakistan. What do you see as the transformation of thinking, say over the past 10 years, both about the U.S. role in Afghanistan and the relationship with Pakistan and that “Af-Pak” as Richard Holbrooke called that link itself?

Chayes: In the early years I saw the military as being much more switched on about Pakistan’s role, particularly military officers that I encountered in the field who were watching it. They were watching in 2003, 2004, 2005.

Mullins: When you were in Afghanistan.

Chayes: Correct. I remember hearing an officer say, “If it were to invade Pakistan, I would sign up for another tour of duty tomorrow.” There was a great deal of frustration on the part of military officers on the ground who were watching the facilitating role that the Pakistani military was playing with the insurgency. As you move higher up in the ranks and you are not as exposed to that reality, it’s quite hard for people to believe that this is actually going on and you are hearing that Pakistan is an ally. I would say, on the side of the State Department even more so, that the State Department is kind of hardwired to interact positively with its counterparts. So, it’s very hard to ask State Department officials to think critically about their counterparts, particularly a country that is being described as a vital ally.

Mullins: Thank you Sarah Chayes.

Chayes: Thank you.

Mullins: Sarah Chayes is author of “The Punishment of Virtue: Inside Afghanistan After the Taliban.”

Copyright ©2009 PRI’s THE WORLD. All rights reserved. No quotes from the materials contained herein may be used in any media without attribution to PRI’s THE WORLD. This transcript may not be reproduced, in whole or in part, without prior written permission. For further information, please email The World’s Permissions Coordinator at theworld@pri.org.

"Ready for rent" (Photo: Laura Lynch)

Behind the security gates lie the secrets to living safely and living well in Afghanistan. I’ve come for a tour of a house, a mansion really, that is sitting empty.

“And it’s ready for rent and everything is clean and clear and recently painted,” said Mohammed Daoud Rahimi, the real estate agent. He eagerly showed the features of the five story, seven bedroom home.

“It has the central heater and also the cooling system.” The main salon also has a series of crystal chandeliers.

There is a jacuzzi tub downstairs and rows of roomy closets.

The influx of cash that accompanied foreign aid agencies, diplomats and private security firms led to a big building boom in Afghanistan, especially in the cities.

In 2009 alone, house prices jumped 75 percent, but it seems the good times may be coming to an end. Rahimi has 15 vacant houses on the market.

“For example, before the rent on this house was about $ 14,000 per month and this season it’s available for $9,000,” Rahimi said.

A conference focused on rebuilding Kabul was held in the splendor of the spectacular Babur Gardens southwest of the old city last week. It seemed a world away from the bleak reality of life for most Afghans. But it was where the mayor of Kabul was seeking fresh ideas and money to salvage his city.

Kabul Mayor Muhammad Younus Nawandish (Photo: Laura Lynch)

“All these houses you can see, this is illegal. 70 percent of the houses are unplanned and most of them are illegally. Because this is a big challenge for Kabul municipality,” he said.

It is an enormous challenge, caused partly by rising house prices and partly by the rising population. Kabul has grown from 1.5 million to 5 million residents over the last several years without any formal planning, as frightened Afghans piled into the city from rural areas. As rents climbed, people simply moved further out and built wherever they could.

Nawandish is keenly aware of the problems facing the community and also of the city’s dependence on foreign money to keep it going.

“This is very important for Kabul and Kabul economy to have the assistance of the international community. Now we have assistance from the World Bank, the United States, Turkish government, Japanese government, United Arab Emirates and other countries.”

It adds up to billions of dollars. The United States alone spends about $320 million a month in non-military aid across the country. Plucking grapes from a plate in front of him, Nawandish laments the end of such largesse, even as he promises he will find another way.

“Unfortunately, I became the mayor of the Kabul in the end of this big assistance. I am not happy to lose this big assistance. But it is the politics, if they want to leave we do not have another option. But we are working on another form of the income of the Kabul municipality. I am sure we will increase the income.”

Income may well mean higher taxes on residents and businesses in one of the few places in Afghanistan where it is safe enough to even try to collect them and that makes life even harder for local businesses.

Hajji Hameed (Photo: Laura Lynch)

Meant to cater to the tastes of foreigners living in the city, the store also attracted locals with three floors of food, clothes and hardware, but Hameed has watched business slide.

“The main problem here is security, the security situation is very bad,” said Hameed. “We do not have customers for months if there’s a bombing in Kabul.”

For him, it is all made worse by the rising costs that accompanied the foreign community driven boom of the last decade.

“The rent has gone up a lot recently even though the economy and the security situation is getting worse every day. In order to pay the rent, taxes and utility bills, I’ve had to get a loan and spend my savings.”

Add to that the unique and dramatic problems facing entrepreneurs here. Hameed has done well over the years, opening other stores, buying property. That made him a target. Two years ago, he was kidnapped.

The men who grabbed him one night as he made his way home from work demanded the equivalent of $700,000.

“I sold two houses and I borrowed $200,000 from the bank. I was held for 19 days and nights and they only released me after they received the ransom,” says Hameed.

Now, he has hired bodyguards to protect him and he closes the store early. He says it all makes it harder to pay back his growing debts. Hameed’s difficulties highlight the critical link between security and the economy – and the need for both to ensure Afghanistan’s future.

The only other viable parts of Afghanistan’s economy are illicit – drugs and smuggling. Earlier this year, the US Senate Foreign Relations committee warned that the country could suffer a severe economic depression when the majority of foreign troops leave in 2014.

That worries many Afghans who have never been able to build a sustainable economy and a peaceful existence.

The Haqqani network has been blamed for a series of recent attacks in Kabul. Sirajuddin Haqqani claimed his organization is not linked to Pakistan’s intelligence agency, the ISI.

Read the Transcript
The text below is a phonetic transcript of a radio story broadcast by PRI’s THE WORLD. It has been created on deadline by a contractor for PRI. The transcript is included here to facilitate internet searches for audio content. Please report any transcribing errors to theworld@pri.org. This transcript may not be in its final form, and it may be updated. Please be aware that the authoritative record of material distributed by PRI’s THE WORLD is the program audio.

Marco Werman: I’m Marco Werman and this is The World, a coproduction of the BBC World Service, PRI and WGBH Boston. President Hamid Karzai said today Afghanistan will no longer engage directly in peace talks with the Taliban; rather, Karzai said the talks will be with the country backing the Taliban. That’s widely seen as a not so thinly veiled reference to Pakistan. Afghan and US officials have accused Pakistan of supporting the Haqqani Network, that’s the group accused of assassinating the head of Afghanistan’s peace council. Burhanuddin Rabbani was tasked with negotiating with the Taliban. He was killed by a suicide bomber in Kabul. Earlier today we learned that a top Haqqani leader denied his group was involved. Sirajuddin Haqqani made that comment along with many others in a recording to the BBC’s Pashto Service.

Sirajuddin Haqqani: [speaking Arabic]

Werman: That’s Haqqani offering his greetings and acknowledging that a face-to-face interview would have preferable. Jonathan Marcus is the BBC’s Defense and Diplomatic Correspondent, he says journalists with the Pashto service had provided written questions to Sirajuddin Haqqani.

Jonathan Marcus: They expected to get back written answers and in fact, what they got back was a computer dongle, a small drive on which there were audio answers to their questions. One has to stress though of course that this wasn’t an interview though in the sense that they were able to put pressure on him to followup on any of those questions, so it very much one removed.

Werman: There’s been some general confusion about what the Haqqani Network is exactly, whether they represent the Taliban, whether they’re separate from the Taliban. Just on this point alone what did Sirajuddin have to say about that?

Marcus: Well, it’s interesting because he placed very much in the mainstream of the Taliban and the movement, suggesting that planning, finances and direction for their operations came from the center. Now, that isn’t necessarily the way I think many western analysts see the Haqqani network. I think they regard this as one the more violent Jihadist organizations and indeed it’s the organization that’s believed to be responsible for some of the most violent audacious attacks in the Afghan capital, Kabul, over recent weeks and months.

Werman: And the $64,000 question is is the Haqqani Network working on behalf of Pakistan’s military intelligence service, the ISI, allegations that were put forth by former Admiral Mike Mullen, what did Sirajuddin Haqqani have to say about that?

Marcus: Well, you’re absolutely right, Admiral Mullen made it very clear that in his view the Haqqani Network was essentially a veritable arm of Pakistan’s intelligence services. The Haqqani Network itself denies this. Sirajuddin Haqqani says that his organization has had links or certainly contact with all sorts of people from Pakistan, from the Americans, from other Islamic and non-Islamic countries and so on, many of those contacts he says have continued, but he insists to use the phrase that he uses that there are no such links with Pakistan at the moment that could be beneficial for the Mujahideen. So he seems to be distancing his organization from Pakistan. Now, you would expect him to presumable say that, clearly that is in variance with the very highest level intelligence from the Pentagon itself.

Werman: Now, in the past few days Afghan President Hamid Karzai has said that since the killing of Afghan peace envoy, Burhanuddin Rabbani, Karzai is no longer going to entertain any negotiations with the Taliban and instead will focus on talking with Pakistan. How does that fit in with what the Haqqani Network has been saying in this interview and what is the big picture here? Who does and who does not want to talk to whom?

Marcus: Well, the big picture is that the Americans have got their drawdown timetable in Afghanistan pretty well set. They need to do various things to achieve that timetable; part of it is practical matters, but equally there’s an important political dimension as well which is to try and get elements of the Taliban who can be won over to consider playing some legitimate role in the future governance of the country. Now, in that battle Pakistan is obviously a key player. You have groups like Haqqani Network, which being a particularly effective element of the Taliban’s military forces is really an important force to try and win over. And I think that perhaps it’s in that light that Mr. Haqqani’s comments have to be seen because there are many analysts in the west certainly who believe that in a sense a lot of what we’re seeing now has to be interpreted as something of a power struggle within the myriad elements that make up the Taliban itself.

Werman: Jonathan Marcus is the BBC’s Defense and Diplomatic Correspondent. Thanks so much, Jonathan.

Marcus: Thank you.

Copyright ©2009 PRI’s THE WORLD. All rights reserved. No quotes from the materials contained herein may be used in any media without attribution to PRI’s THE WORLD. This transcript may not be reproduced, in whole or in part, without prior written permission. For further information, please email The World’s Permissions Coordinator at theworld@pri.org.

Fawad Mohammadi selling his maps in Kabul (Photo: Laural Lynch)

Both are poor, both are dreaming of a better life.

In the opening scene, Ahmad, an orphan who lives on the street, greets his friend Rafi who lives with his father in the slums. Ahmad survives by stealing and by heading out into traffic, to try to persuade drivers to give him money.

His face streaked with dirt, his clothes ragged, Ahmad is aggressive as he offers what he says is incense meant to protect people from evil spirits. He urges the drivers to give him money. Most simply ignore him and move on.

This may be a movie – make believe – but sadly, it’s a reality for so many children who live here.

Chicken Street in Kabul is a destination for the few foreigners who are willing to take the risk of shopping downtown, knowing both it and they are potential targets for attacks.

The road is lined with stores selling carpets, antique swords and guns from the 1800′s.
It also has its own army of street kids.

Twelve year old Fawad Mohammadi is one of them. He is a young man selling old maps with a great big smile.

Just listen to him charm a would be customer.

Fawad has been selling maps and gum on the streets of Kabul since he was five years old. Like tens of thousands of other children in Kabul, he was sent out to help support his family after his father died.

Fawad Mohammadi (Photo: Laural Lynch)

“When I’m working on the street, I always look at what’s going on around me,” Mohammadi said. “I try to stay away from places that might be targets for bombers. And if I see someone who looks suspicious, I try to keep away from them.”

No child should have to learn such harsh lessons.

According to UNICEF, more than 30 percent of children of elementary-school age are working on the streets in Afghanistan and are often their family’s sole breadwinners.

Muhammed Yousef has been trying to help vulnerable children for more than a decade as the founder of the children’s charity Aschiana.

He says since allied forces defeated the Taliban, the situation for children has improved. More than 7 million of them now go to school.

“But even now there are 4.5 million children who don’t have access to education and in their area there is no peace, no security,” Yousef said. “The children have a problem.”

The problem goes beyond working on the street. A recent study of Afghan children’s mental health by Durham University in England – the first large scale survey of its kind – found one in five children suffers from psychiatric disorders, including anxiety, depression, and post traumatic stress disorder.

Some children are forced into near slavery, early marriage or they become involved in the drug trade. In that sense, Fawad feels fortunate, but that does not mean he likes working the streets.

“I deal with a lot of different people, when I try to sell them a map,” Mohammadi said. “Sometimes they push and insult me and when they insult me, I really feel ashamed.”

Muhammed Yousef thought the lives of children would change more dramatically when foreign forces entered the country a decade ago.

“All of the people had hope, because a majority of people thought the war had ended and we would have a peaceful country. We would have access to education and our children would be protected. The children would not have to work in the street anymore, there would not be kidnapping, the government would be very strong abd we would be living in peace,” Yousef said.

That has not happened.

Fawad’s story though, has taken a relatively happy turn. Relative by Afghan standards. Just over a year ago, Fawad was plucked off Chicken Street by an American filmmaker and cast in “Buzkashi Boys.” Since then, Fawad has also acted in a commercial.

It is not enough work to keep him off the street, but another foreign national has decided to pay for his education. So while he still has to go to Chicken Street to sell his maps every Friday, he spends the rest of the week in school and he says he loves it.

Seemingly wise beyond his years, Fawad simply accepts his fate as a child growing up in Afghanistan.

“This life is a test, God is testing us and we have to try to do our best to succeed,” Mohammadi said.

For three decades now, generations of children in Afghanistan have been raised in a land of violence and war and that hasn’t ended with the end of Taliban rule.

Some have been scarred, physically and psychologically, for life. Many will never carry memories of a carefree childhood into their adult years.

For them, being a child here means just trying to survive.

Graffiti by Shamsia Hassani (Photo: Shamsia Hassani)

It began in the darkness of night. Guerrilla warriors of a different kind, armed with cans of spray paint. They painted slogans such as “cost of war” and stenciled images of helicopters, guns and soldiers onto the high concrete walls of buildings in the city.

They weren’t Afghan, but they came back in the daytime, and showed locals like Shamsia Hassani how to create street art.

“It was my first time and it was a very new experience for me because it was different. Usually we use brush but it was spray paint. It was different and a little difficult for me because it was my first time.”

Hassani was one of a group of Afghans who attended a workshop held by a British artist. She was captivated and soon went to an industrial park to create her first work – a huge mural showing a group of women wearing blue burkas emerging from water. (See the image above.)

“You can see the water and woman coming from the water,” she says. “Blue is a freedom color is a clean color and I shows that all Afghan women are like water clean and blue.”

It might be a portrait of progress or hope were it not for the menacing black background. Walls in Kabul are often covered in simple advertising slogans. This new artistic frontier is irresistible to many including Ahmed Ali Akbar. After the workshop, he created his own image of a man screaming.

“This kind of art has rarely been seen here in Afghanistan. It’s something new. Luckily, I was part of the first workshop on it. It’s new and it’s interesting,” says Akbar.

And just in case you think it’s all the preserve of young disaffected youth – Akbar is the director of Afghanistan’s National Gallery.

He says he’s seen a wide range of graffiti – from slogans critical of corruption, political incompetence and druglords to flowers that are meant to signify peace.

“There’s no one single way to characterize it, the main goal is for an artist to express his ideas to the public.”

But trying to exercise freedom of expression here isn’t easy. Even though many walls do carry advertising, graffiti artists aren’t so welcome. So they work at night and work quickly for fear of being caught by police, private security or criminal kidnap gangs.

As a woman, the challenges are even greater for Shamsia Hassani in this conservative country. She’s created wall art only twice – both times inside open air compounds but she’s not letting that stop her.

“I couldn’t go to street to do graffiti work and I decided to have to find a way for myself and I start.”

Captivated by the art form, Shamshia now uses computer software to digitally paint on photos of Kabul’s streets. While she may not gain the same kind of recognition of her male peers, she’s hoping she’ll be able to stage a show – trying to guarantee graffiti is accepted as real art no matter where it appears in the city.

Read the Transcript
The text below is a phonetic transcript of a radio story broadcast by PRI’s THE WORLD. It has been created on deadline by a contractor for PRI. The transcript is included here to facilitate internet searches for audio content. Please report any transcribing errors to theworld@pri.org. This transcript may not be in its final form, and it may be updated. Please be aware that the authoritative record of material distributed by PRI’s THE WORLD is the program audio.

Marco Werman: Sultana Parvanta lives in Kabul, Afghanistan. She grew up there, but she left during the harshest years of Taliban rule. Sultana Parvanta returned after the fall of the Taliban to work on women’s rights and other issues. We’ve had her on the program many times over the years. Today, as we approach the 10th anniversary of the US invasion of Afghanistan we asked her to look back at that moment almost a decade ago when Afghans around the world starting returning to their homeland.

Sultana Parvanta: Most people from Afghanistan who were literate or who were as professionals, they all had left Afghanistan. After the fall of the Taliban they came back, so they had seen. They had seen educated women, they had seen western ways of living, modern ways of thinking, modern ways of being, and their children — oh, versed in the latest technologies — they all came back by the millions. And I personally thought it was an amazing experiment in the world history, in the new century to have all the world come together and assist a nation that was devastated by war. And so there was a lot of hope.

Werman: At the start the west focused on the horrific plight of women in Afghanistan under the Taliban and it seemed the new government, the Karzai government wanted to advance the cause of women, and they did at first; but in recent years President Karzai has come under harsh criticism for making concessions to the Taliban at the expense of women. What would you say is the status of women today in Afghanistan?

Parvanta: We must count our blessings for as far we’ve gotten, and the girls have gone to school, the Afghan women have shown tremendous potential. However, there have been some laws passed by this government that have totally undermined the idea of empowering women. Having a seat for the women in the gatherings, we sometimes just get the seat, but not listen to their ideas or not implement their ideas. They are sort of there but not heard.

Werman: Right, I’m wondering if you can share an example or two of women you know who’ve suffered from that experience of being seen and not heard?

Parvanta: Afghan men in general are extremely kind and very generous in their kindness, and also very charismatic. But when it comes to actually a decision, a policy, a suggestion, you’re not taken very seriously. It’s like glossed over. I make a suggestion, the women, and I think if a man colleague makes the same suggestion, that’s considered more than mine.

Werman: Do you have an example of how you experienced that recently?

Parvanta: Well, I’m experiencing it all the time in every meeting almost. I’ve experienced it 7-1/2 years working in the government. So, I think Afghan women suffer tremendously in many, many ways. I was thinking of a woman I know. She’s from Khost[? 2:59] you know, she was widowed in the war where she lost her husband and she was left with 3 daughters and 1 son. And that she was so hopeful to raise her son to get a job in Khost. And they couldn’t get a job for him and he joined the military, the police. And wanted to get the training, get the job and support his family and maybe even have some money to get married and all that. And just before his first paycheck he was killed on a police post attack by Taliban.

Werman: Oh, do you think the United States understands the Taliban? Do you think the US overestimates the threat of the Taliban or underestimates it?

Parvanta: Underestimates it.

Werman: Really.

Parvanta: Totally, if people lived in this society and they saw the pain and the cause of suffering. You know, the attacks in the past few weeks here alone have been completely unnerving and is like they are winning actually. You know, that’s the sad thing and it’s very hard for everybody else, including me, to admit that. And I think as a human you ultimately do breakdown sometimes in sorry, but I still in the midst of that, I see potential. I know the city is bustling and growing. People are moving around. You know, the society is afraid and a little bit panicked, and some mistrust is there and fear of 2014 when the NATO forces leave. But meanwhile people are strongly connecting and bonding with each other. You know, that’s maybe the most positive thing.

Werman: Afghan resident, Sultana Parvanta, spoke to us from Kabul.

Copyright ©2009 PRI’s THE WORLD. All rights reserved. No quotes from the materials contained herein may be used in any media without attribution to PRI’s THE WORLD. This transcript may not be reproduced, in whole or in part, without prior written permission. For further information, please email The World’s Permissions Coordinator at theworld@pri.org.

The museum's focus is on landmines but it also features many other weapons, such as rockets (Photo: Iqbal Sapand)

* The broadcast of this report incorrectly cites 40 people that are estimated to be killed or injured each day in Afghanistan. The figure is actually per month. We regret the error.

Read the Transcript
The text below is a phonetic transcript of a radio story broadcast by PRI’s THE WORLD. It has been created on deadline by a contractor for PRI. The transcript is included here to facilitate internet searches for audio content. Please report any transcribing errors to theworld@pri.org. This transcript may not be in its final form, and it may be updated. Please be aware that the authoritative record of material distributed by PRI’s THE WORLD is the program audio.

Marco Werman: Hundreds of protestors took to the streets of Kabul, Afghanistan today. They demanded an international investigation into last week’s assassination of former president, Burhanuddin Rabbani. He was killed at his home in Kabul by a suicide bomber. The Afghan capital has seen a sharp rise in violence in the past couple of weeks, that includes two attacks on US targets in Kabul — one was a 20 hour siege of the US embassy by militants firing rocket propelled grenades from a nearby construction site; the other was Sunday’s fatal shooting inside the CIA office. The World’s Laura Lynch is in Kabul. All these reports make Kabul out to be suddenly more of a target for militant attacks. Have you sensed that on the ground, Laura, is it palpable?

Laura Lynch: Well, I think certainly people feel more tense than they have in a while and it is because so many things have happened in such a short space of time. I was speaking to a member of parliament this morning who told me that she noticed that everywhere she went and everyone she talked to just seemed to be so much more on edge than they had been in the past. And you’ve got to remember that this is a place and these are a people who are used to an awful lot of violence. So to sense that they’re feeling a little bit more on edge than they usually do, that’s saying something.

Werman: Have people changed their daily routines at all?

Lynch: To some extent they’ve been forced to change their daily routines because when these incidents have happened parts of the city have been locked down and you can’t move anywhere within those parts of town. So it’s all these disruptions to life here, which is not easy at the best of times. If you’ve ever been in Kabul, then there are the most extraordinary traffic jams you’ve ever seen. Well, this just makes it worse. In spite of all that, people are trying to get on with life and trying to stick to their routines as much as they can. The shops are open, not easy for them, but they’re trying to get things as normal as they can be.

Werman: Kabul used to be considered the one place in Afghanistan that US and Afghan forces could really protect. What has changed that?

Lynch: I think that some would say is that the US forces and the other international forces have drawn back and have let the Afghans take care of the security in this city. And it was seen as a test for the Afghans, if they could control security within Kabul itself. And when there was the incident two weeks ago, the 20 hour siege, you saw these insurgents were firing on the US embassy and they had to bring out US soldiers to get involved on the roof of the embassy to fire back. They didn’t want to get involved directly in the operation in the city itself because they needed to let the Afghan army show and the Afghan police that they could take care of their own. But boy, that sure shook a lot of people’s confidence in the Afghan forces’ ability to take care of security in this city.

Werman: In the wake of these high profile attacks, Laura, has it become harder for you and other journalists to do your jobs?

Lynch: Well, I’ve been here for a week now and I knew when I was coming that there were going to be restrictions in the way I could do my job, and that’s been true of working here as a journalist for some time now. It’s meant that I have to figure out where I’m going, if I should be in a crowd, whether that’s too much of a risk. So, absolutely it affects the way that you can report and it affects your ability to tell the story — the way you tell a story, if I was in London for example, or some other city where I could move about freely and stay anywhere as long as I want.

Werman: Well, yesterday you reported on Afghan widows who live in a neighborhood overlooking Kabul. Was that a dangerous thing to do?

Lynch: Well, you wouldn’t think so. It’s not dangerous in and of itself, Marco, but the rule of thumb nowadays is if you are going to go to a place perhaps on the fringes of the city, refugee camps, you better not stay long. And the fear is that there might be people who are looking at you, seeing you as a foreigner, seeing you as someone they might be able to kidnap for ransom. And these things you do pay attention to. So I stayed there for about 20 or 25 minutes. I would’ve much rather stayed longer, and I had to get back.

Werman: Laura, remind us of the last time you were in Kabul and tell us about one thing that you noticed that really struck you, something that surprised you.

Lynch: Well, the last time I was here was in 2007 and the first change that I noticed when I came back here this time was actually a good change — an airport that was an absolute mess and has now become a relative model of efficiency and security. So that is a good thing. But the other thing I’ve noticed driving around now is the number of barbed wire and security guards around government buildings, around cultural buildings, around private homes. To an extent it seems like this really is far more of a city under siege than it was a few years ago.

Werman: The World’s Laura Lynch in Kabul. Thank you, Laura.

Lynch: You’re welcome.

Copyright ©2009 PRI’s THE WORLD. All rights reserved. No quotes from the materials contained herein may be used in any media without attribution to PRI’s THE WORLD. This transcript may not be reproduced, in whole or in part, without prior written permission. For further information, please email The World’s Permissions Coordinator at theworld@pri.org.