When the US & NATO first occupied Afghanistan in 2001, the US claimed it was all about women’s rights & routing Osama bin Laden from the cave where he was hiding. Tony Blair in the UK claimed it was to wipe out the flourishing heroin trade. Now 11 years later, the Afghan heroin trade has increased from 185 tons per year to a staggering 5,800 tons per year. Officials like to blame the drug trade on the Taliban--but it’s US military planes flying the stuff out to be processed. With millions of Afghans in refugee camps in & outside Afghanistan, that baloney about liberating women is exposed as cynical & idiotic. And now we know, bin Laden was never in a cave in Afghanistan; he was in Pakistan with an entire entourage of aides, wives, nearly a dozen kids, & his dialysis equipment. These justifications for war would be farcical if they weren’t so truly tragic, if the Afghan people weren't paying such a terrible price. This photo of a child miner loading his donkeys with coal at a mine in Samangan, Afghanistan (north of Kabul) gets to the real reasons behind this barbaric invasion. Geological surveys indicate massive deposits of oil, gas, copper, iron, gold, coal, uranium, lithium, emeralds, & rubies all over Afghanistan. These untapped mineral reserves could generate billions/trillions in revenue--but not for the Afghan people. The government has already contracted out mining rights to India & China, where the massive fortunes accrued will be divided between Afghan oligarchs & foreign investors. Demand the immediate, unconditional withdrawal of all US-NATO troops so the people of Afghanistan can start ridding the country of their own predacious oligarchs. (Photo by Qais Usyan/AFP)
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