(from my e-mail)
Massive open-ended contracts have been granted without competitive bidding or with limited competition to many of the same politically connected corporations which are doing similar work in Iraq: Kellogg, Brown & Root (a subsidiary of Halliburton), DynCorp, Blackwater, The Louis Berger Group, The Rendon Group and many more. Engineers, consultants, and mercenaries make as much as $1,000 a day, while the Afghans they employ make $5 per day.
These companies are pocketing millions, and leaving behind a people increasingly frustrated and angry with the results.
Fariba Nawa, an Afghan-American who returned to her native country to examine the progress of reconstruction, uncovers some examples of where the money has (and hasn’t) gone, how the system of international aid works (and doesn’t), and what it is really like in the villages and cities where outsiders are rebuilding the war-torn countryside.
In Afghanistan, Inc., you’ll get an inside look at a system gone out of control, with little accountability and plenty of opportunity for graft and abuse. It isn’t a story you want to read; it’s a story you must read.
THE FULL REPORT WILL BE PUBLISHED ON TUESDAY, MAY 2nd.
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Advocating for the Rights of Conscientious Objectors in the Military