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CNN Live At Daybreak
Between Collateral Damage and Impending Winter, Conditions in Afghanistan Are Poor
Aired November 01, 2001 - 06:05 ET
THIS IS A RUSH TRANSCRIPT. THIS COPY MAY NOT BE IN ITS FINAL FORM AND MAY BE UPDATED.
THIS IS A RUSH TRANSCRIPT. THIS COPY MAY NOT BE IN ITS FINAL FORM AND MAY BE UPDATED.
CATHERINE CALLAWAY, CNN ANCHOR: And as Ed just reported, U.S.- led airstrikes have been focusing recently on northern Afghanistan targets and that has allowed people to return to Kandahar in the south to try and piece together a normal life.
CNN's Nic Robertson toured the destruction in the Taliban stronghold and talked to its residents.
(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)
NIC ROBERTSON, CNN CORRESPONDENT: Guns and grins, a Taliban escort prepares for the day. The heavily armed fighters provided for our protection, the Taliban say, for a tour of bomb sites that puts military facilities off limits.
ROBERTSON: Downtown there was anger. Abdul Hadi vents his rage about lost friends.
ABDUL HADI: (INAUDIBLE)
ROBERTSON: Close by in the rubble of his cousin's tailoring store, 11-year old Farid recites the names of the three relatives he says died when a bomb destroyed it.
FARID: (INAUDIBLE)
ROBERTSON: Whether or not they claim to have lost loved ones, all here appear to unite in the condemnation of America.
(INAUDIBLE)
ROBERTSON: Mohammed, a rickshaw driver, says America should not fight the poor people. "If they're going to fight bin Laden, they should fight him not us."
Across the road, and reduced to rubble too, Taliban ministry buildings. Bombed, people here say, minutes before the tailor store. Likely an intended target, these destroyed offices of the feared religious police serves to highlight how a downtown target can be hit by a precision missile.
But what the Taliban really want us to see here is just how much collateral damage there is and how many civilians have been injured. (INAUDIBLE)
ROBERTSON: Outside his recently bombed house, Haji Abdul Kaiune says he doesn't know why it was destroyed and refutes the idea there is a military base nearby. His friend Nazar Ahmed explains why many Afghans are now united.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: (INAUDIBLE) Osama bin Laden (INAUDIBLE) ...
ROBERTSON: "It's not the issue of Osama bin Laden. They have not hit any Arabs," he says. "You can see with your own eyes, they hit civilians."
And so the tour continues to other sites. Along the way, however, a burnt out armored personnel carrier sits close to houses. Downtown a U.N. demining vehicle camouflaged with mud, cruises around with a new owner at the wheel. And out of town in the mountains, more military hardware dispersed for safekeeping.
(INAUDIBLE)
ROBERTSON: One of the Taliban top military commanders, however, claims only 15 soldiers have been killed in the four provinces he leads and that morale is good.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE (through translator): We are not demoralized. In fact, the morale has been very strong and after the American airstrikes, we have become much more united and stronger. We believe in Jihad and we want to become martyrs and we will fight until the last man.
ROBERTSON: Tough talk echoed by the Taliban foreign minister who used a rare television appearance to quell rumors of splits in the Taliban.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE (through translator): The Muhajideed people of Afghanistan are passing through a very critical time. That's because Afghan people have been brutalized by big powers.
ROBERTSON: Nic Robertson, CNN, Kandahar, Afghanistan.
(END VIDEOTAPE)
LEON HARRIS, CNN ANCHOR: The U.S.-led bombing campaign has given hope to a million displaced people inside Afghanistan, but as the bombing goes on, the hopes of these refugees to return to their homes is dwindling. CNN's Matthew Chance reports from the Panshir Valley as the Afghan refugees prepare for another bitter winter.
(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)
MATTHEW CHANCE, CNN CORRESPONDENT: A distribution by the Red Cross of rations for the bitter months ahead. Even the youngest is sent here to collect whatever supplies aid workers will help carry to their mountain camps.
These sacks of rice could mean survival for entire communities, but the relief here is tinged with regret.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE (through translator): We're happy to have this rice, Mohammed, tells us, but its a return to our homes that we really wanted.
CHANCE: But even amid the U.S.-led campaign to topple the Taliban, when they'll return is still anybody's guess.
There are few places where expectations for the U.S.-led campaign have been so high, these people have every reason to want it to succeed. But after a nearly month of intensive bombardment, even these families are losing faith.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: (INAUDIBLE)
CHANCE: In the camps nestled amid the Panshir Valley, just a few thousand of Afghanistanis, millions are displaced. In these mud and canvas shelters, whole families have crammed together for months, even years. And as a harsh winter looms, so too does disappointment they're still unable to leave.
Mohammed Kawzam (ph) left his home in Kabul three years ago to escape the Taliban. Now he says the United States must do more to help, or see Afghanistans internally displaced suffer another bitter snowfall.
"It was so cold last winter," he says, "many people died here. This year could be even worse. We have fewer blankets and warm clothes."
But with little progress on the frontlines, the refugees in these harsh Afghan mountains appear poised to remain. Towards the cold months ahead, acceptance of further hardship is leading hope of early relief.
Matthew Chance, CNN, northern Afghanistan.
(END VIDEOTAPE)
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