Revived Taliban restrict Afghan aid effort
A spike in attacks in the southern provinces has restricted aid agencies to major cities at a time when NATO says it's crucial to deliver better services.
from the May 10, 2007 edition
Page 3 of 3
The US Agency for International Development (USAID), by far the country's largest donor, allocates more than half of its aid to the four restive southern provinces, the report said. The report cited a disproportionate amount of aid that was being delivered to insecure or opium-producing areas.
This approach overlooks the massive development needs in comparatively stable areas and "creates perverse incentives – for provinces to create insecurity to attract resource," the report added.
The unbalanced distribution has had observable effects on the aid effort. Over the last year, the situation in the north and west – areas once branded peaceful by the international community – has deteriorated sharply.
There have been more attacks on aid agencies in the north and west than in the south during the first quarter of this year, the majority of them criminal, according to statistics from the Afghanistan NGO Security Organisation.
Only 12 percent of the attacks on aid agencies nationwide occurred in the south, where 40 percent of the incidents linked with the insurgency took place.
By contrast, 26 percent of incidents took place in the north and northeast – a region that saw only 5 percent of the actual armed military conflict.
The conflict has also spread closer to Afghanistan's capital, Kabul, where most international aid agencies are based. The past month has seen clashes between suspected Taliban and government forces in western Herat's Shindand districts and in Kapisa, just 75 kilometers north of the capital Kabul.
In this climate, entering new areas to deliver aid means first gaining the trust of local communities – a method that takes time and still more aid resources.
"Where trouble arises there is no quick fix," says Anja de Beer, the head of ACBAR.
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