'Plugging Afghanistan's Brain Drain', National Public Radio, 20 November 2008
EXCERPT: "The future of war-ravaged Afghanistan could be determined by a new generation of people committed to helping the country rebuild. Khaleeq Ahmad, who returned to Afghanistan days ago to work for an Afghan telecom company, is one of them. He's hopeful that he can follow Mohandas Gandhi's charge to 'be the change you want to see in the world.' Although Ahmad, 30, was born in Afghanistan, he grew up and went to college in the U.S. In 2002, he went back to his home country to work as an aide to President Hamid Karzai. Five years later, he left for graduate school in London, and later began working for the telecom company in Virginia. But he decided his real mission was in Afghanistan. Ahmad notes that not having electricity due to 'state bureaucracy' is more likely to bother him than security issues and points to the erratic electricity as a symptom of a larger problem facing Afghanistan. 'The most important advantage that a person from the West would bring to Afghanistan, other than an Afghan person coming from the West, was his management skills,' he says. Although skilled professionals have come to work in Afghanistan, he says, they leave the country once their contracts are over, leaving behind little in the way of training or infrastructure."
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See also:
'Major international initiative urged on Pakistan security, Afghan stability & regional development', Associated Press of Pakistan, 20 November 2008
'Covering Afghanistan', The National Post, 20 November 2008
'India proposes three-prong strategy for Afghanistan', The Hindu, 10 November 2008
Related posts:
'Security issues curb Afghanistan recruitment', 23 October 2008
'Beset by war, beleaguered by poverty', 22 August 2008
'Over 42% of population live in extreme poverty', 11 August 2008
'How to save Afghanistan', 17 July 2008
'Afghanistan needs more than money', 11 June 2008
