060612 Massoud Circle and Blue Burkas
On the way to the airport to pick up the FNG we drove through Massoud Circle (see pics.) Massoud is revered in Afghanistan and he was opposed to the radical Islam of Al Qaeda. So two days before 9/11, he was taken out. The whole story and reference is below.
Also in much of the middle east the burka is worn by women. In Iraq and Kuwait it is black but in Afghanistan the traditional color is blue. The woman in the blue burka (pic above) was begging in the middle of the street. The pic of the boys in the blue shirts was taken outside a high school (I know because it was big English letters.)
"Ahmad Shah Massoud (September 1953 – September 9, 2001) was a Kabul University engineering student turned military Leader who played a leading role in driving the Soviet army out of Afghanistan, earning him the nickname Lion of Panjshir. His followers call him Amir Sahib-e Shahid (Our Martyred Commander). An ethnic Tajik, Massoud was a moderate of the anti-Soviet resistance leaders.
Following the withdrawal of Soviet troops from Afghanistan and the subsequent collapse of the Soviet-backed government of Mohammad Najibullah, Massoud became the Defense Minister in 1992 under the government of former Afghan President Burhanuddin Rabbani. Following the collapse of Rabbani's government and the rise of the Taliban in 1996, Massoud returned to the role of an armed opposition leader, serving as the military commander of the United Islamic Front for the Salvation of Afghanistan (known previously as the Northern Alliance).
On September 9, 2001, two days before the September 11 attacks in the United States, Massoud was assassinated in Takhar Province of Afghanistan by suspected al-Qaeda agents."
http://www.waymarking.com/waymarks/WM85MD_Afghanistan_Iraq_War_Memorial_Massoud_Circle_Kabul_Afghanistan
R/Chris
