By Mark Sappenfield, The Christian Science Monitor
When Hajji Zekrullah Ahmadyar drives out of Herat, he witnesses an urban tableau that is in many ways atypical of modern Afghanistan.
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BBC News - Afghanistan has made sufficient steps in improving its economy to qualify for debt relief, the World Bank and International Monetary Fund have said. Under the Heavily Indebted Poor Countries Initiative, Afghanistan will now have its net public and private debt payments cut by 51%.
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BBC News - More than a decade after the Coca Cola bottling plant in Afghanistan was ravaged by artillery fire, the company is back with a gleaming new facility in capital, Kabul.
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Reuters - The International Monetary Fund on Monday approved a loan arrangement of about $119 million for Afghanistan to help fight poverty.
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By Ashraf Ghani, The Financial Times (UK)
There is an emerging consensus, domestic and international, that Afghanistan is likely to slide into chaos. This misses the central point: there are assets in place that, if organised coherently, could re-establish momentum towards creating a stable, prosperous and democratic Afghanistan. If failure is not an option for the international community, attention must be focused on renewing Afghans’ trust in a bright future to make them active partners in the fight against violence and disorder.
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KABUL (The News) - The Afghan parliament approved its first national budget on Saturday after allowing for a pay hike for civil servants that had delayed its passage by a fortnight, officials said.
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By ABDUL WAHEED WAFA, NY Times
KABUL, Afghanistan — Afghanistan's Parliament overwhelmingly rejected the government's budget on Sunday after Finance Minister Anwar-ul-Haq Ahadi told legislators that international donors would not agree to raise the salaries of teachers and other government workers.
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By David Montero, The Christian Science Monitor
KABUL, AFGHANISTAN - Pashtun Begum used to beg door-to-door in Kabul, offering to wash clothes. It was the only living available, she thought, for a widow like herself.
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By Mark Dummett, BBC News
The Kabul Star football is manufactured in a large house in the Afghan capital. The production line runs through its many rooms.
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AFP - India pledged an extra 50 million dollars in aid to Afghanistan for a total of 650 million dollars since 2001 and said it would consider a new credit facility to boost trade.
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PESHAWAR (Asia Pulse) - Following Pakistan's recent ban on cement exports to Afghanistan, the country's Ministry for Commerce said on Sunday that the government had increased investment in the sector to meet local demand and also control prices.
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KABUL (IRIN) - A World Bank report released on Saturday said that the investment climate in Afghanistan was improving, but identified key constraints to capital inflows. The report called on the government to do more to promote private-sector development.
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PTI - Ahead of the visit of US President George Bush, India has decided to join the US-backed Turkmenistan-Afghanistan-Pakistan pipeline to import natural gas to meet the fuel needs of its growing economy.
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IRNA - Pakistan and Afghanistan will hold ministerial-level talks in Islamabad on Monday about the long-delayed multi-billion dollar Turkmenistan-Afghanistan-Pakistan (TAP) gas pipeline project, officials said on Sunday.
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