Afghanistan Agriculture

He is a long way from home, this dark, lanky Afghan in the flowing white clothes and bushy, untrimmed beard. As a devout Muslim, he is nervous to be photographed walking along the boardwalk at Laguna Beach, worried that the background will feature the oiled flesh of half-naked sunbathers, concerned that the photo won't play well in Peshawar. That worry, though, is gnat-sized compared to the monstrous problem that brought Mirwais Wardak here from Pakistan.

California date growers trying to get their produce to hungry Afghans say their "date diplomacy" efforts have been fruitless so far. The California Date Commission has petitioned the White House, the Department of Defense and other federal agencies to include California dates in food packages being distributed in Afghanistan as a humanitarian gesture during the U.S. war on terrorism.

Afghanistan's Taliban rulers ordered a complete ban on growing poppies, the plants from which heroin is made and a major crop in the Central Asian nation. It was not clear what prompted the order from the group's supreme leader, Mullah Mohammed Omar. The order, which was reported on Taliban-run Radio Shariat, came just two months before planting season for poppy growers in several provinces of Afghanistan, the world's largest opium-producing nation.

Afghanistan's Taliban rulers ordered a complete ban on growing poppies, the plants from which heroin is made and a major crop in the Central Asian nation. It was not clear what prompted the order from the group's supreme leader, Mullah Mohammed Omar. The order, which was reported on Taliban-run Radio Shariat, came just two months before planting season for poppy growers in several provinces of Afghanistan, the world's largest opium-producing nation.

With their Y-shaped divining rods and uncanny sense of the desert, the nomads of the Rigestan could find water almost anywhere. But for three years the winds have brought no rain, and now even the hardy wandering people known as the Kuchis are coming in from the desert. "My father is buried in the desert, and my grandfather's father is buried in the desert," said Raz Mohammed, a 96-year-old nomad who had stopped with his family along a riverbank here.

California date growers trying to get their produce to hungry Afghans say their "date diplomacy" efforts have been fruitless so far. The California Date Commission has petitioned the White House, the Department of Defense and other federal agencies to include California dates in food packages being distributed in Afghanistan as a humanitarian gesture during the U.S. war on terrorism.

Warning that the U.S. is "running out of time" in Afghanistan, the military's top uniformed officer said Wednesday that officials have asked for a "new, more comprehensive strategy" that also encompasses militants' havens in neighboring Pakistan. Appearing before a House committee, Adm. Michael G. Mullen, the chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, said such a strategy was crucial to the ability of U.S.-led forces to counter a comeback by extremist groups in Afghanistan. "I'm not convinced we're winning in Afghanistan," said Mullen, although he added, "I'm convinced we can."

Soviet leader Mikhail S. Gorbachev acknowledged for the first time Monday that the Soviet Union is doing basic research similar to American scientific work for the Reagan Administration's Strategic Defense Initiative (SDI) program of space-based missile defenses. Gorbachev, interviewed by NBC News television anchorman Tom Brokaw, said, however, that Moscow never would build or deploy a "Star Wars" system, as the U.S.

A convoy of 50 Sputnik-era trucks labors along the desert highway, unable to keep pace with the dust ghosts whipped up from the scabbed soil by the wind. Inside are several hundred tons of wheat, seeds and household goods, as well as 1,293 refugees from drought, headed back to the land that rejected them. They are two hours behind schedule. It is past noon, and Ondrej Zapletal, a Czech aid worker leading this ragtag exodus, watches his best-laid plans wisp away like those dust bowl specters.

The used Datsun pickup truck was purchased for $13,700 from its unsuspecting owner in the border town of Peshawar and packed with a huge quantity of explosives--the equivalent of 500 pounds of TNT. On a Sunday morning in November, a normal working day in this overwhelmingly Muslim country, the vehicle was piloted by a suicide driver through the gate of the Egyptian Embassy in Islamabad and detonated with devastating effect. The concussion stripped the bark from trees across the street.

With their Y-shaped divining rods and uncanny sense of the desert, the nomads of the Rigestan could find water almost anywhere. But for three years the winds have brought no rain, and now even the hardy wandering people known as the Kuchis are coming in from the desert. "My father is buried in the desert, and my grandfather's father is buried in the desert," said Raz Mohammed, a 96-year-old nomad who had stopped with his family along a riverbank here.

He is a long way from home, this dark, lanky Afghan in the flowing white clothes and bushy, untrimmed beard. As a devout Muslim, he is nervous to be photographed walking along the boardwalk at Laguna Beach, worried that the background will feature the oiled flesh of half-naked sunbathers, concerned that the photo won't play well in Peshawar. That worry, though, is gnat-sized compared to the monstrous problem that brought Mirwais Wardak here from Pakistan.