What Path Forward? Afghanistan Continues to Haunt and Perplex

A year and a half after the Taliban’s military takeover of Afghanistan, the hardships of daily life in this overwhelmingly aid-dependent country have grown increasingly dire. With cold, hunger and poverty threatening a humanitarian catastrophe, the international development community seems determined not to turn away as it did in the 1990s, yet the government’s restrictive and authoritarian policies could block even basic humanitarian aid. How to navigate this increasingly desperate predicament is the subject of our conversation this week with Abdullah Ahmadzai, The Asia Foundation’s Afghanistan country representative.