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It marks an end to months of bureaucratic wrangling between Islamabad and New Delhi

It marks an end to months of bureaucratic wrangling between Islamabad and New Delhi

Foreign Secretary Harsh Shringla flagged off a convoy of 50 trucks carrying 2500 tonnes of wheat as humanitarian aid for Afghanistan at the India-Pakistan integrated checkpost (ICP) on Tuesday, the first of about 1,000 truckloads which will head for Jalalabad over the next few weeks.

The wheat is expected to be sent across Afghanistan to help people deal with the crisis caused by food shortage and an economic collapse after the Taliban takeover of Kabul. The assistance was made in response to appeals made by the United Nations for humanitarian assistance to Afghanistan, the Ministry of External Affairs said.

Traders and truckers in Amritsar also welcomed the trans-shipment, which is taking place after being suspended for nearly three years, and expressed the hope that the opening for Afghan aid would also lead to a reopening of India and Pakistan trade, whose closure has caused massive economic losses in the border town.

The wheat assistance will be delivered in multiple consignments and will be handed over to the United Nations World Food Program (WFP) in Jalalabad, Afghanistan, an MEA statement said

World Food Program Country Director Bishaw Parajuli, who had helped complete the negotiations with India, and Afghan Ambassador Farid Mamundzay were also present at the ceremony. According to officials, the wheat, procured by the Food Corporation of India (FCI), has been specially double bagged to protect it from contamination along the 500-km journey from Attari to Jalalabad, and then to other centres for distribution.

The wheat shipment, which was packed in special bags stamped Gift from the people of India to the people of Afghanistan, marks an end to months of bureaucratic wrangles between New Delhi and Islamabad. The consignment had been originally offered to the Taliban leadership in October 2021, but was held up due to objections from Pakistan.

Once Pakistan Prime Minister Imran Khan announced he would allow the trans-shipment as an exception, and other permissions were secured from Islamabad, it was further delayed by Punjab election, and trucks from Afghanistan finally came to Attari on Monday to be loaded, a day after Punjab polling. Afghan trucks will ply the route, not Indian trucks, as per the Pakistani stipulations, and the drivers are given permits instead of visas by India.

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Tony Gamal-Gabriel (AFP)

Baghdad, Iraq Tue, March 1, 2022 2022-03-01 20:05 19 6ecd2a3b02ae141944722af30e91255d 2 Middle East and Africa Afghanistan,Russia,CBS,Western-powers,Ukraine,war,media,Racism Free

The world has been stunned by Russia's invasion of Ukraine, but shock quickly gave way to indignation in other strife-torn parts of the world over media commentary many saw as racist against them.

"This isn't a place -- with all due respect, you know -- like Iraq or Afghanistan that has seen conflict raging for decades," said Charlie D'Agata of US network CBS News.

"This is a relatively civilised, relatively European -- I have to choose those words carefully too -- city where you wouldn't expect that or hope it is going to happen."

A day later, after much online furore, D'Agata apologised for his "poor choice of words".

This was just one of many remarks on reputable media outlets drawing a line between the conflict unfolding in Ukraine and those in other parts of the world.

Many Arabs were quick to point out the double standard, noting that while the toll of war may be similar in the respective conflicts, the media treatment is not.

Some also drew a comparison between Europe's welcoming of Ukrainian refugees and the influx of Syrians, Iraqis and Afghans, which was declared a "migrant crisis".

Political scientist Ziad Majed said that, while there was "magnificent solidarity" from the world over the Ukraine conflict, it also revealed a "shocking distinction".

The discrepancies in media treatment revealed the "dehumanisation of refugees from the Middle East", said Majed, a professor at the American University of Paris.

"We can understand that the Ukrainians are Europeans, and that the memory of war in Europe can revive a lot of emotions," he said.

But he stressed that "when we hear some commentators speaking about 'people like us', this suggests that those coming from Syria, Iraq, Afghanistan or Africa are not (like them)".

'Racist coverage'

The Qatari channel Al Jazeera English was also not immune to the controversy.

"These are not, obviously, refugees trying to get away from areas in the Middle East that are still in a big state of war," said one of its anchors. "They look like any European family that you would live next door to."

The network later issued an apology, describing the remarks as "insensitive and irresponsible".

Salem Barahmeh, director of the pro-Palestinian platform Rabet, was quick to point out seeming discrepancies in the commentary.

"Refugees are welcome depending where they come from," he wrote on Twitter, adding that "resistance to occupation is not only legitimate but a right".

The Arab and Middle Eastern Journalists' Association condemned "examples of racist news coverage that ascribes more importance to some victims of war than others".

"This type of commentary reflects the pervasive mentality in Western journalism of normalising tragedy in parts of the world such as the Middle East, Africa, South Asia and Latin America."

'Civilised'

For Syrians, the disparity in media treatment is particularly striking as Russia launched a bloody intervention to prop up Bashar al-Assad's regime more than six years ago.

Before the war in Ukraine, Majed said, Syrian territory served as a "laboratory" for the Russian army, on which it "tested its arsenal and tactics".

Journalist Philippe Corbe referenced that conflict when he spoke about the Ukraine refugee flow on French broadcaster BFM TV.

"We are not talking about Syrians fleeing the bombardment of the Syrian regime, supported by Vladimir Putin," he said.

"We are talking about Europeans who are leaving in their cars, that look like our cars... and who are just trying to save their lives."

Contacted by AFP, the broadcaster said Corbe's remarks were "clumsy but taken out of context... (and) led to the mistaken belief that he was defending a position opposite to the one he wanted to emphasise, and he regrets this".

AdeelaOfficial, an Instagram account dedicated to humorous commentary on celebrity news, took a break from the jokes to decry media "racism".

"The Western media claims to protect human rights and defend democracy, when in reality it is ignorant, racist and cannot see beyond its own nose," it charged.

Afghans have also expressed exasperation over Ukraine coverage, just six months after the Taliban seized control in a lightning offensive that sent the country spiralling into chaos and hundreds of thousands of people into exile.

Many have highlighted what they saw as an emphasis media has put on Christian Europeans with "blond hair and blue eyes" becoming refugees, marking them out as different from other victims of war.

"It is the same point being made again and again: people in all other conflicts were half humans, of lesser worthy origin and race, but Europeans are full humans. So this war matters," said Muska Dastageer, a university lecturer.

The normalisation of war in the Middle East and so-called third world countries and "the assumption that they deserve war is just one of the reasons why those wars lasted so long," added Aisha Khurram, a former youth representative to the United Nations.

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Afghanistan ranked last in the World Happiness Report among 149 countries surveyed, with Lebanon following.

Afghanistan is the unhappiest country in the world even before the Taliban swept to power last August. That is according to a so-called World Happiness Report released before the United Nations-designated International Day of Happiness on Sunday.

The annual report ranked Afghanistan as last among 149 countries surveyed, with a happiness rate of just 2.5. Lebanon was the worlds second saddest country, with Botswana, Rwanda and Zimbabwe rounding out the bottom five.

Finland ranked first for the fourth year running with a 7.8 score, followed by Denmark and Switzerland, with Iceland and the Netherlands also in the top five.

Researchers ranked the countries after analysing data over three years. They looked at several categories, including gross domestic product (GDP) per capita, social safety nets, life expectancy, freedom to make life choices, generosity of the population, and perceptions of internal and external corruption levels.

Afghanistan stacked up poorly in all six categories, as it did before the Talibans return to power. The country was under the United States occupation for 20 years during which Washington alone spent $145bn on development, according to reports by the US special inspector general for Afghanistan.

Still, there were signs of increasing hopelessness.

Gallup conducted a poll in 2018 and found that few Afghans they surveyed had much hope for the future. In fact, the majority said they had no hope for the future.

Afghans have faced years of war, corruption, grinding poverty and lack of jobs.

When Masoud Ahmadi, a carpenter, returned to Afghanistan from neighbouring Pakistan after the 2001 collapse of the Taliban, his hopes for the future were bright.

He dreamed of opening a small furniture workshop, maybe employing as many as 10 people. Instead, sitting in his dusty six-foot by 10-foot workshop on Saturday, he said he opens just twice a week for lack of work.

When the money came to this country, the leadership of the government took the money and counted it as their personal money, and the people were not helped to change their life for the better, said Ahmadi.

Since the Taliban returned to power last August, the countrys economy has been in free fall, worsened by the US sanctions and its diplomatic and financial isolation. The Taliban has urged the international community to recognise its new government as it struggles to revive the economy battered by decades of war and foreign interventions.

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Afghanistan worlds unhappiest country, even before Taliban - Al Jazeera English

Afghan girls participate in a lesson at a high School, in Herat, on Nov. 25, 2021. Petros Giannakouris/AP hide caption

Afghan girls participate in a lesson at a high School, in Herat, on Nov. 25, 2021.

On the first day back to school in September 2021, one month after the Taliban took over Afghanistan, Maryam, a 15-year-old girl from Mazar-i Sharif, remembers the fear and uncertainty she felt on her way to school.

NPR is not using her last name so she can speak freely. She and other students were greeted by Taliban soldiers at the entrance. Later that day, they also came in to the classrooms

"The Taliban entered our class and most of the girls ran to the back of the classroom and turned around. They didn't want to see their faces. They don't want to see the Taliban," Maryam said.

The Taliban came in to classrooms every day to check that all girls were wearing headscarves and gloves to cover their hands. Maryam's assigned seat was in the very front in the first row, and she recalls the anger and defiance she felt each time they barged in. But she refused to leave her seat like her classmates.

"I didn't want them to know I was afraid of them. I just sat there and refused to look at them," she said.

Maryam is one of the few lucky older girls in Afghanistan who have been able to go to school since the Taliban takeover.

Mazar-i Sharif, where she lives, is in Balkh, the only province that has kept schools open for older girls. Several other provinces have had some schools open for girls at different times, but for the vast majority of the country, girls above the 6th grade have not been allowed to go to school.

The inconsistency is due to disagreements about girls' education among the Taliban ranks, and without a cohesive policy on schools, the government in Kabul has left decisions to provincial Taliban officials.

Now, schools in Afghanistan are expected to open for the new semester on Wednesday, after a long winter break.

But despite Taliban assurances that all girls will be allowed back in schools, students and teachers are still unclear about what will happen. Afghanistan's Taliban-run Education Ministry did not respond to NPR's repeated requests for comment.

In Kabul, 17-year old Fatima Sadat, who dreams of being a successful psychologist, hasn't been to school in seven painful months, she said. She's been worried about her future, and is constantly asking her teachers for updates on whether she'll be allowed to go.

"Every teacher that we ask, they say we do not know and let's wait and see what happens," she said.

"We're still not going to know until the morning of the 23rd, whether the schools are actually open or not," said Heather Barr, the Associate Women's Rights Director at Human Rights Watch, who is based in Pakistan and focuses on Afghan women and girls.

And there's a risk that the Taliban might only open schools in visible areas, like big cities.

"There's the potential for some kind of photo ops at the same time that schools in rural areas may not get the same treatment," Barr said.

When it comes to girls' access to education in Afghanistan, the issue is broader than just schools being open. Class attendance for girls in provinces where schools were open dropped significantly.

Maryam from Mazar-i Sharif noted that of the 40 girls in her class, only 15 showed up at school for the rest of the term after the Taliban takeover. Barr says it's because the daily tensions with the Taliban have had a psychological effect on girls and their families.

"Everybody knows that the Taliban don't really want you to go and that's going to make people feel unsafe and it's going to undermine the efforts of girls who are trying to advocate for themselves and convince their families that they should be allowed to go," she said.

Another aspect is employment. Under the Taliban there are few sectors where women are allowed to work, mainly as teachers and health care providers to other women. And opportunities are few. Barr said that lowers the appeal for families to educate their daughters.

"Why would you study? Why would you and your family make enormous sacrifices for you to be able to complete high school, go on to university? You're not going to have the career that you dreamed of and you're not going to be able to provide the support to your family," she said.

After seven months of Taliban rule, most observers say not much has changed when it comes to their policies on women and girls. Barr notes the Taliban seem to be much more responsive to international pressure. But global attention on Afghanistan has waned.

"It's really frustrating in this moment where, this is the most serious women's rights crisis that's happened in the world since the last time the Taliban took power. And the response from the international community seems to largely be a bit of a shrug," Barr said.

Despite that, Fatima Sadat refuses to lose hope for her future and the future of Afghanistan.

"We will all be so happy if, God willing, schools reopen again for girls so that we can continue our education for the future of our country, to become successful servants and be able to stand our country back on its feet," she said.

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As school resumes in Afghanistan, will all girls be allowed to go? - NPR

Days before Afghanistan fell to the Taliban last August, Ashraf Ghani, the Afghan president, was welcomed to the United Arab Emirates. He was alleged to have taken with him $169m, from his countrys treasury.

Six months on, Khalid Payenda, once Ghanis finance minister, is driving an Uber in Washington DC.

If I complete 50 trips in the next two days, I receive a $95 bonus, Payenda told the Washington Post, from behind the wheel of a Honda Accord.

The 40-year-old once oversaw a US-supported $6bn budget. The Post reported that in one night earlier this week, he made a little over $150 for six hours work, not counting his commute a mediocre night.

The Post recorded Payenda telling one passenger his move from Kabul to Washington had been quite an adjustment.

He also said he was grateful for the opportunity to be able to support his family but, Right now, I dont have any place. I dont belong here and I dont belong there. Its a very empty feeling.

Afghanistan faces a humanitarian and economic crisis, assets frozen and cut off from international aid that would require recognition of the Taliban government which replaced the US-supported regime.

The Post described Payendas experience in late 2020, when his mother died of Covid-19 in an impoverished Kabul hospital. He became finance minister after that. The Post said he now wished he had not.

I saw a lot of ugliness, and we failed, he said. I was part of the failure. Its difficult when you look at the misery of the people and you feel responsible.

Payenda told the Post he believed Afghans didnt have the collective will to reform, to be serious. But he also said the US betrayed its commitment to democracy and human rights after making Afghanistan a centerpiece of post-9/11 policy.

Maybe there were good intentions initially but the United States probably didnt mean this, Payenda said.

Payenda resigned as finance minister a week before the Taliban seized Kabul, as his relationship with Ghani deteriorated. Fearing the president would have him arrested, he left for the US, where he joined his family.

We had 20 years and the whole worlds support to build a system that would work for the people, Payenda said in a text message to a World Bank official in Kabul on the day the capital fell, quoted by the Post.

All we built was a house of cards that came down crashing this fast. A house of cards built on the foundation of corruption.

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Afghanistans former finance minister is now Uber driver in Washington DC - The Guardian