{"id":141428,"date":"2014-11-04T17:03:17","date_gmt":"2014-11-04T17:03:17","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/rinf.com\/alt-news\/?p=141428"},"modified":"2014-11-04T17:03:27","modified_gmt":"2014-11-04T17:03:27","slug":"another-58-6-billion-us-troops-afghanistan","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"http:\/\/rinf.com\/alt-news\/war-terrorism\/another-58-6-billion-us-troops-afghanistan\/","title":{"rendered":"Another $58.6 Billion for US Troops in Afghanistan?"},"content":{"rendered":"<div class=\"mainauthorstyle\"><em>KATHY KELLY<\/em><\/div>\n<div class=\"main-text\">\n<p><em>Kabul.<\/em><\/p>\n<p>Yesterday, in the <a href=\"http:\/\/ourjourneytosmile.com\/blog\/the-winter-duvet-project\/\">Afghan Peace Volunteers\u2019 (APVs\u2019) \u201cBorderfree Center\u201d<\/a>here in Kabul, I heard someone banging on the front gate and hurried downstairs to open it. As it happened, I was the only one at the Center that morning. Outside the gate stood two women with their burkas pushed back.<\/p>\n<p>They had come a long way on foot. Reza Gul, the younger of the two, told me, as they stepped into our front yard, that they had walked for an hour and a half through Kabul to reach us. Zahro, the older woman, smiled and asked that I please put both of them on \u201cthe list.\u201d Both women were desperate for the APVs to include them in <a href=\"http:\/\/vcnv.org\/the-duvet-project-an-invitation\">\u201cThe Duvet Project,\u201d<\/a> which would allow them, for a few months, to provide for their families by making heavy blankets, called duvets.<\/p>\n<p>These heavy quilts, stuffed with wool, can make the difference between life and death during Kabul\u2019s extremely harsh winters. For the past two winters, the APVs have relied on women in their local area to manufacture thousands of duvets which are then distributed free of charge. The women are paid a living wage for their labor.<\/p>\n<p>Last winter, 60 women, 20 from each of Afghanistan\u2019s three main ethnic groups, made, between them, 3,000 duvets for Kabul\u2019s poorest, all in the name of practicing nonviolent solutions for Afghanistan.<\/p>\n<p>It\u2019s a good project. Along with bringing needed warmth to destitute families, it invites people from different walks of life to work together. And, in a society where women have few if any economic opportunities, the women\u2019s earnings help put food on the table and shoes on their children\u2019s feet.<\/p>\n<p><a href=\"http:\/\/www.counterpunch.org\/2014\/11\/04\/another-58-6-billion-for-us-troops-in-afghanistan\" target=\"_blank\">Read more<\/a><\/p>\n<\/div>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>KATHY KELLY Kabul. Yesterday, in the Afghan Peace Volunteers\u2019 (APVs\u2019) \u201cBorderfree Center\u201dhere in Kabul, I heard someone banging on the front gate and hurried downstairs to open it. As it happened, I was the only one at the Center that morning. Outside the gate stood two women with their burkas pushed back. They had come [&hellip;]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":117762,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[487,16],"tags":[],"class_list":{"0":"post-141428","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-breaking-news","8":"category-war-terrorism"},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"http:\/\/rinf.com\/alt-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/141428","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"http:\/\/rinf.com\/alt-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"http:\/\/rinf.com\/alt-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/rinf.com\/alt-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/rinf.com\/alt-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=141428"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"http:\/\/rinf.com\/alt-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/141428\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/rinf.com\/alt-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/117762"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"http:\/\/rinf.com\/alt-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=141428"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/rinf.com\/alt-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=141428"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/rinf.com\/alt-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=141428"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}