Photo Gallery Life and Suffering in Afghanistan

Western aid workers have long been deeply involved in Afghanistan, putting their lives at risk and fighting for funding back home. Still, they have accomplished little or have seen much of their work destroyed. Many will be leaving the country in disappointment.
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Without spare parts, three police vehicles donated by Germany are forced to sit idle on the property of a police station in Faizabad, in the northeastern corner of Afghanistan.

Foto: dapd
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According to many observers, the living conditions in Afghanistan have not improved in the last 10 years. Here, a bread seller awaits his customers.

Foto: Muhammed Muheisen/ AP
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The divide between rich and poor remains enormous, and has likely become more deeply entrenched than it was before the conflict. Here, an Afghan trash collector works.

Foto: Kamran Jebreili/ AP
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While there is a super-wealthy, corrupt upper class, the rest of the country remains poor, like this young girl scavenging for recyclable items at a dump outside Kabul.

Foto: SHAH MARAI/ AFP
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A boy on the streets of Kabul. Helping Afghanistan doesn't just rest on funding, but on finding qualified personnel willing to put themselves in danger.

Foto: SHAH MARAI/ AFP
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Here, a young boy plays in front of a palace near Kabul ruined during his country's civil war. Aid organizations report that infrastructure is one of the few things to improve in the last 10 years. There is electricity, drinking water, new streets and bridges. But many fear this will all be destroyed when Western forces leave the country.

Foto: Gemunu Amarasinghe/ AP
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Observers predict that another civil war is likely to break out as soon as that happens. Here, young members of the nomadic Kuchi people are shown in their camp outside Kabul. They are among the many fragmented groups living inside the country.

Foto: Dar Yasin/ AP
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Here, a member of the Hazara minority: Many groups feel oppressed by the majority Pashtuns. Meanwhile, development workers, shut inside compounds for their safety, complain they have been cut off from making real connections in the country.

Foto: SHAH MARAI/ AFP
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"The regulations enormously limit aid workers' freedom of movement," says one aid worker. "I'm not even allowed to go shopping at the bazaar. We are losing our sense of the country, of the people, of life here."

Foto: Alexandre Meneghini/ AP
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An Afghan farmer harvests wheat. Because the presence of Western forces and aid organizations have brought little change to the country, many living there have lost trust in them.

Foto: Dusan Vranic/ AP
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These women, widowed by the war, are among some 500 taking part in a project to make bedding. An aid organization provides the materials.

Foto: AHMAD MASOOD/ REUTERS
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Poverty forces many families to send their children to work. This boy arranges bricks at a facory near Jalalabad.

Foto: Rahmat Gul/ AP
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Many development workers fear that the radical Islamist Taliban, members of whom are shown here, could take over again after the troop pullouts.

Foto: STRINGER/AFGHANISTAN/ REUTERS
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Some 2,500 farmers are involved in producing the valuable spice saffron, shown being harvested here. But the company lacks more such industries to fuel economic growth.

Foto: Majid Saeedi/ Getty Images
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One of the tasks belonging to Western aid organizations is training security forces. Here women are shown training at a Kabul police academy.

Foto: Majid Saeedi/ Getty Images
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Coupling the efforts of military and development programs have made many Afghans suspicious. Here residents protest a NATO raid that left four dead in May 2011. Fears of being attacked have increased considerably among aid workers.

Foto: Ezatullah Pamir/ AP
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Terrorist attacks, kidnappings and killings are a constant threat. Here a victim is taken away from a bomb blast in Kabul in December 2009.

Foto: AHMAD MASOOD/ REUTERS
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Hanz Sayami (left) has been engaged in Afghan aid projects for years, but has decided not to return for the time being. "The current situation makes it impossible to keep going," he says.

Foto: Omar Sayami
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Six years ago he built a school for boys, shown here, in northern Afghanistan with money he gathered in Germany.

Foto: Omar Sayami
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Later a school for girls was also built in the same area in Char Gul Tepa, a town in the northern part of Kunduz province.

Foto: Omar Sayami
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Several hundred boys and girls attended school there, but Sayami and his assistants have stopped visiting regularly because it is too dangerous.

Foto: Omar Sayami
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Here a boy at the school is shown using a sewing machine with pedal-power due to frequent electricity outages.

Foto: Omar Sayami
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Many people survive by running tiny businesses, like this shoemaker. Sayami, a Hamburger with Afghan roots, founded the group "Initiative Afghanistan" to help rebuild the country.

Foto: Omar Sayami
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Here gas pumps are delivered in Kunduz. According to Sayami, the situation in the country has deteriorated so much that constructive work is hardly possible. He dissolved his aid group this year.

Foto: Omar Sayami
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Here a young girl is taken to a MEDEVAC helicopter after being wounded by shrapnel aimed at US soldiers in her village. One aid worker said that working with troops had been a "taboo-breaker" in the eyes of the locals, who no longer trust development projects.

Foto: Scott Olson/ Getty Images
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Here a young Afghan boy with gunshot wounds is shown. Working with NATO damaged the reputation of aid organizations in the eyes of the locals, some say.

Foto: Paula Bronstein/ Getty Images