Afghanistan now wants back the migrants it has given

After my visit to Afghanistan last month, I received reactions expressing serious astonishment at the series of articles I wrote. I had tried to convey developments and situations that can in fact be easily followed from open sources, as someone who witnessed them closely. That what I wrote strikes people as so surprising is the result of people's perceptions of Afghanistan under Taliban rule still being locked in a certain conditioning. They suppose that the Taliban are nothing but a band of militants who could have no education, vision, refinement or state-management skills. Yet the Taliban, as the name says, is a union of students, that is, their profession is studentship, knowledge, science, education. Without forgetting, of course, that the state of being a "talib" has a meaning far beyond and deeper than studentship in Turkish.

Their uncompromising war against the United States for 20 years, and before that their way of life within worlds of their own truths that cared nothing for the world, did not seem likely to have anything important to say to our Westernized worlds. Yet, as I said before, coming from the depths of so many bloody conflicts and taking over the administration, because of the general amnesty it declared that very hour and the peace and stability it has established across all of Afghanistan, Afghanistan deserves every attention and appreciation.

After all, Afghan society is a society in which traditions, especially the tradition of blood feud, are very widespread and strong. In such a society it is not so easy for the state to declare a general amnesty, and setting that aside, if it has declared one, it is not so easy to enforce it. Because, since this declaration by the state will run against the people's customs, traditions and mores, it is close to impossible that it will not meet resistance. The state declares the amnesty on its own, but the people still do as they know and go after their own blood feud, so the cycle of violence and war that will never end continues. Yet the text of a few lines that the Taliban leader Akhundzada declared, inspired by what our Prophet did at the conquest of Mecca, made an effect above the power of all traditions, customs and mores, and brought the amnesty to life.

In fact, the Emirate's rule makes as strong an effect as possible against all the other traditions contrary to Islam as well. There are many mores, contrary to the Shariah, that oppress women and grant them no rights, and that are quite influential from the depths of Afghan society. They are now passing entirely through the filter of the law the Taliban have put into practice and are starting to work in favor of the human being in general and of women in particular. These are large details that those who look only through the clichés the Western media has produced on the issue of women's education alone cannot see.

Moreover, even on the subject of women's education, the situation is not at all as supposed. On this occasion we also learn that a serious system preparation is under way concerning girls attending university.

We had said that, for the first time in 45 years, a stability and an atmosphere of peace valid across the whole country had been established in Afghanistan. One of the most evident results of this stability is that a serious development drive has started in the country. News of investments that can only be realized with a very strong and stable central administration is beginning to arrive one after another.

In my earlier articles I had said that Afghanistan is waiting for foreign investors. To be sure, although foreign investors are still delayed because of the uncertainty of Afghanistan's recognition protocols at the UN, the Afghan state has begun making its own investments itself, quickly. For example, we recently saw a very simple result of the more effective use of the state budget, owing solely to having reduced corruption to zero: for the first time, Afghanistan has cleared all of its electricity debt to neighboring countries.

6 new oil wells were opened in the Amu Darya oil field, and the daily extraction level was raised to 1,350 tons. At present a total of 24 oil wells are ready for extraction. New oil fields have been discovered in many other areas, and with the latest developments Afghanistan is moving quickly toward entering the category of oil-producing countries.

We had said that one of the country's strongest aspects is its human resources. To make use of these human resources, we had said that labor-intensive investments, for example in textiles or in agriculture and livestock, could be shifted to the country.

Now a large dam that has begun to be built on the Amu Darya (Ceyhun) and whose construction is progressing rapidly signals that Afghanistan will enter a development process much faster than supposed.

The Qosh Tepa Canal Project has long been a great desire and hope for all Afghans, especially those living in the Northern provinces. With the arrival of the Islamic Emirate and its establishment of stability, this wish has come to the threshold of being realized. With the completion of the canal project, the boundless arid deserts of Northern Afghanistan will be turned into agricultural land and developing industrial zones.

The project carries approximately 650 cubic meters of water per second from the Amu Darya to the deserts of Balkh, Jowzjan and Faryab provinces and turns 300,000 hectares of desert into fertile farmland. The canal's width is on average 100 meters, its depth 8.5 meters, and its water height 6.5 meters.

The canal, with a total length of 285 km, takes its water from the Amu Darya in the Galdar District of Balkh Province, passes through the deserts of the Galadar District and intersects with "Haratan-Mazar-i-Sharif"

You can think of the project, whose first stage will be completed in about 6 months, as Afghanistan's GAP.

Because the water going to the countries of the region will decrease, the project does cause some tensions between Afghanistan and neighboring countries. But more important, only a stable and strong administration can undertake such a gigantic project inside the country.

In fact, these developments also give instructive messages about who, and how much, has delayed the development of a country with historical and cultural depth in the heart of Central Asia, one with extremely strong potentials in its human resources, its underground resources, its waters and its logistical position. In 40 years the occupiers made no investment other than 4 million drug addicts, but when the country passes into the hands of its own owners, it can move rapidly toward such a horizon of development.

Only, I don't know whether this news should be good tidings or bad news for those who have for years been badgering about Afghan irregular migrants. Because it appears that the internal peace and economic developments, which are consolidating further with each passing day in the country, herald that the emigration of the Afghan people abroad will stop entirely, and even that a return migration will set in.