Afghanistans Record Suffering
Sad times for Afghansand a nationwide poll proves it. A Gallup survey published Friday found that more than six out of 10 Afghans say they are suffering, a record high anywhere in the world since Gallup started asking people to evaluate their lives.
Three other findings are particularly striking: Among the Afghans polled, more believe theyre even worse off than they were last year. No one polled considered themselves to be thriving. And the perception of suffering was uniform across Afghan society.
In many countries, younger people give more positive life evaluations, particularly when rating their future lives. In Afghanistan, however, there are few differences in suffering by gender or age, Gallup reported.
The survey was released just as the United States and its NATO allies are winding down their combat mission after 13 years. The results indicate that Afghans feel they have gained less than they had hoped or expected from the costly international interventionand the United States longest war.
During his final trip to Afghanistan as defense secretary, Chuck Hagel was optimistic about the countrys future. As difficult, as challenging, as long as this has been, by any definition the country of Afghanistan, the people of Afghanistan, are far better off today than they were 13 years ago, if for no other reason than they have the opportunity to decide their own fate, their own way, on their terms, he told reporters traveling with him Saturday.
Theyre not completely there yet, but theyve come a long way and thats to the credit certainly of the United States, he said.
But the Gallup poll indicates that many Afghans do not share Mr. Hagels optimism. Its difficult to see how Afghans life evaluations could get much worse but the current combination of violence, drug addiction and intractable poverty makes it equally difficult to envision any improvement, at least over the short term, Gallup concluded.
In the meantime, rampant hopelessness among the population makes concerns about the growth and influence of extremist groups in Afghan society as real as ever.
Cultivation of poppiesfor heroin and opiumis higher than when the United States intervened to oust the Taliban after Sept. 11, 2001, attacks. The United Nations reported last month that opium cultivation would hit a record high in 2014up 7% from 2013, despite U.S. eradication programs that have cost more than $7 billion since 2001. Addiction is high too.
Poverty is also still rampant. Sixty-seven percent of Afghans polled said that economic conditions were getting worse, with almost nine of out 10 dissatisfied with efforts to reduce poverty.
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Afghanistans Record Suffering