Bush stretched the truth on Afghanistan

In his farewell address to the nation last evening, George W. Bush painted a rosy picture of the situation in Afghanistan.

He said:

Afghanistan has gone from a nation where the Taliban harbored al Qaeda and stoned women in the streets to a young democracy that is fighting terror and encouraging girls to go to school.

He failed to mention that the Taliban is back, and that women and girls face ongoing threats of violence.

Amnesty International provides a more realistic overview of the situation in Afghanistan:

Women in the public sphere remain at high risk of attack by the Taliban and other fundamentalist groups. [...] Track star Mahboba Ahdyar, only the third Afghan woman to ever qualify for the Olympics, dropped out of training in July 2008 to seek political asylum in Norway after a series of threats against her and her family in Kabul. In an especially troubling development, schools, teachers, and students -- especially those dedicated to educating girls -- have also been targeted. For example, in June 2007 two gunmen opened fire on schoolgirls outside of Kabul, shooting six and killing two, in what was apparently a politically-motivated attack against female education. And in September 2008, Commander Malalai Kakar, Afghanistan’s most senior female police officer and a mother of six, was shot dead in Kandahar. She had been head of the city’s department of crimes against women.

So, Mr. Bush, they may be encouraging girls to go to school, as you say, but only so they can be used for target practice.

I hope that the Obama administration will do better for the people of Afghanistan.