U.S. steps up its military presence in Africa
Johannesburg, South Africa - When the Bush administration announced the creation of a new Africa Command within its military forces last February, many African diplomats were horrified. Some expressed fears that the US military would follow in the colonial footsteps of Europe in establishing a military presence on the continent with an eye toward controlling Africa's vast resources.
But a few African leaders said, "It's about time."
This week, Africom – as it is known – becomes officially operational, and the man expected to be confirmed as its first commander, Gen. William Ward, will have his work cut out for him in explaining just what the US military intends to do in Africa.
"We can't be the fire department always," says Theresa Whelan, deputy assistant secretary of Defense for African affairs. "We don't have the capacity to constantly run around and solve this disaster and that disaster. Other people have to develop their own fire departments, but we can help them develop their own capacity." Read more?
You go girls!
MAZAR-I-SHARIF, Afghanistan (Reuters) - A model strutting the catwalk is hardly revolutionary in most countries, but Afghan television's answer to "America's Next Top Model" is breaking boundaries and revealing the beauty under the burqa.
Nearly six years after the overthrow of the strict Islamist Taliban government, almost all women in deeply conservative Afghanistan still only appear in public wafting past in the burqa's pale blue, their dark eyes only occasionally visible behind the bars of its grille.
But in the relatively liberal northern Afghan city of Mazar-i-Sharif, a local television station has started to show a different image of Afghan women with an extremely low-budget take on the hit "America's Next Top Model," a reality TV show in which judges choose prospective models from a group of contestants over several weeks.
"I was really enthusiastic to make this program because I wanted the girls to present the clothes and themselves," said Sosan Soltani, the 18-year-old director of the program.
"Afghanistan is free and these girls are the future of this country," she said... Read more?
0 comments:
Post a Comment