FEATURE-High rents may close Kabul "nest" for street kids

[NNN0LHI]

http://www.alertnet.org/thenews/newsdesk/ISL48938.htm

KABUL, May 2 (Reuters) - Engineer Mohammad Yousuf managed to keep his charity for Kabul's street children running during Afghanistan's bloody civil war and throughout the draconian rule of the Taliban in the 1990s.

But three-and-a-half years after the Taliban's overthrow by U.S.-led forces, the future of Aschiana, or "the nest", is in limbo due to soaring rents that have accompanied Kabul's post-war dollar-fuelled boom.

Aschiana provides food, education and vocational training for about 1,000 street children and some of their parents and has been a vital source of hope for some of Afghanistan's most needy.

All this is at risk because the new owner of the three-acre (1.2 hectare) plot on which the charity's main centre is located plans to use the site to put up a posh hotel in a city now marching to the tune of free-market economics.

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[GoddessOfGuinness]

1. What's the average income in Kabul?

Yousuf has been paying $1,500 a month in rent and has been told to leave.

"We cannot afford rents like $9,000 or $10,000 a month that you have to pay now in the centre of Kabul," he said.

[Erika]

2. Globalist king George's efforts comes to fruition

Get rid of the poor scum. We have money to make!