Inside Afghanistan - what the media doesn't show us

Back in 2000 the CBC aired a 30-minute documentary about Afghanistan under the Taliban regime. A couple years later, when the violence in Afghanistan increased as the country was about to hold its first democratic election, the CBC rerun the "Inside Afghanistan" documentary, reminding us what the life under Taliban was like. Militia-men carrying guns and whips which they use at their own discretion. People living under threat of being stoned to death or having their arms and legs chopped off. Women and girls denied such basic rights as education, healthcare, employment... not even allowed to leave home without being accompanied by a male. Poverty. Devastation. Hopelessness. The text wasn't changed, so the narrator spoke in present tense, as if all that was still there...

Back then the Liberals were still in power and supportive to the Afghan mission, so the CBC took its time to remind people what kind of enemy Canadian peacekeepers are fighting. Since then the Liberals changed their mind. They now claim that Canadian involvement in Afghanistan became excessively concentrated on aiding the US-led war on terrorism, rather than helping the Afghans to rebuild their country. Is that so?

Here are some facts about what has been achieved in Afghanistan since 2001:

-Per capita income has doubled
-The Afghan economy has tripled
-200,000 Afghans (90 percent women) have received micro-finance loans
-7.2 million children vaccinated against polio; 4.3 million vaccinated against childhood diseases
-4 million women vaccinated against Tetanus
-77 percent of Afghans have access to medical facilities--compared to less than 10 percent in 2001
-4,000 new medical facilities opened
-Six million children (one third females) now go to school compared to 700,000 (no females) in 2001
-363,000 teachers provided with teaching material
-8,000 km of new and refurbished roads
-2,500 villages have electricity for the first time
-8,000 construction projects completed; 14,000 underway
-4,000 houses and shelters constructed for the needy
-130 Agriculture projects (benefiting 300,000 farmers)
-190,000 mines defused and removed
-8,100 new water points, benefiting 3 million people
-1,700 water reservoirs built

(Source)

Too bad the mainstream media won't mention any of that. But would these achievements be possible without the international peacekeepers, including Canadians, risking their lives, doing their best to maintain peace and stability in Afghanistan? I think the answer is obvious: Support our troops!