'Winter Of Hunger Looms In Afghanistan', The Associated Press, 27 November 2008
EXCERPT: "The farmer squats barefoot on packed earth in front of his two-room mud house. He has looked at his bags of wheat, he says, and counted the days. Ghulam Sakhi, 50, says his family will run out of food in mid-January — only a third of the way through Afghanistan's frigid winter. As the days shorten and the nights grow colder, this winter threatens to be Afghanistan's most desperate in nearly two decades. Life has always been hard in this poor, war-ravaged land, but this year a combination of drought, high food prices and Taliban attacks on supply routes could leave a bigger shortage than emergency food aid can cover. In a country already struggling to combat a strengthening Taliban insurgency, it's a crisis that is testing an overstretched government's limits. Day Kundi, the central province where Sakhi lives, is usually one of the hardest hit by snows and food shortages, but is also relatively peaceful. So Sakhi's family worries less about war and more about simply being forgotten. The couple and their nine children depend on flatbread made from wheat to survive the winter in a barren mountain valley dotted with dusty almond trees and the occasional sheep. They drink water, or tea if they have a little extra money. Once snow blocks the roads in mid-December, the entire town of Nili lives off stored food until spring."
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See also:
'Food insecurity may cause deaths this winter - government', IRIN News, 27 November 2008
'World Food Programme: food shortages are still a threat', Pak Tribune, 26 November 2008
'Security, funding worries trouble Afghan food aid', Reuters India, 25 November 2008
'Worsening security situation forces UN to consider new shipping routes into Afghanistan', Voice of America, 25 November 2008
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