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Afghanistan, Inc.: A CorpWatch Investigative Report

In their latest investigative report "Afghanistan, Inc.", CorpWatch has uncovered massive open-ended contracts, shoddy construction work and corruption by contractors in Afghanistan. These contractors are making big bucks for very bad work. Meanwhile, the Bush Administration touts the reconstruction work in Afghanistan as a success! Can anyone be so naive as to believe any of this? All out of the pockets of American tax-payers. (No wonder the US has no money left over for a universal health-care programme. A vast majority of Americans have no health-care whatsoever and many of these are children!)

These are "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. "

The full CorpWatch report will be published on Monday, May 2nd.

Afghanistan, Inc.: A CorpWatch Investigative Report

Contractors in Afghanistan are making big money for bad work

A highway that begins crumbling before it is finished. A school with a collapsed roof. A clinic with faulty plumbing. A farmers cooperative that farmers can't use. Afghan police and military that, after training, are incapable of providing the most basic security. And contractors walking away with millions of dollars in aid money for the work. The Bush Administration

touts the reconstruction effort in Afghanistan as a success story. Perhaps, in comparison to the violence-plagued efforts in Iraq and the incompetence-riddled efforts on the American Gulf Coast, everything is relative. Our new report Afghanistan, Inc., details the bungled reconstruction effort in Afghanistan.

**If you are in San Francisco on Tuesday, May 2nd, you can meet investigative journalists Fariba Nawa and Pratap Chatterjee, for a night of drinking, music and conversation at 111 Minna Gallery in San Francisco. This event will launch the release of this new report, and will include reportbacks from Afghanistan and Iraq.**

For more information about the event:

http://www.corpwatch.org/article.php?id=13518

MORE ON THE REPORT:

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., youll 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 youwant to read; it's a story you must read.

THE FULL REPORT WILL BE PUBLISHED ON TUESDAY, MAY 2nd.

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posted by Annamarie at 9:41 PM