afghan civilians

In 2010, the U.N. reported that Afghan civilian casualties rose 31 percent, mostly due to insurgent attacks such as suicide bombings. Rumors of corruption are rampant, from President Hamid Karzai’s government to the warlords that lend much of their support to NATO forces. Burqas, once a required covering for women under Taliban rule, are once again a familiar sight in Kabul. And, in several Pashtun villages, the Taliban has closed many schools for girls.

the caucasus at a crossroad: ingushetia

The Republic of Ingushetia is a splinter of land west of Chechnya that is caught in Russia’s struggle to hold on to the North Caucasus. The fighting in Ingushetia has poisoned life in much of the North Caucasus. Ingushetia is the smallest and most impoverished of Russia's provinces, where the rebels and security forces compete in brutality, and even human rights activists carry guns.

uranium nation

Kazakhstan's past and future is intertwined with uranium production. It is currently the number two producer of uranium in the world; and eager to become number one. Between 1949 and 1989 the Soviet Union used Kazakhstan’s prolific uranium mines for nuclear weapons which where then tested on Kazakh soil. Water and soil contamination continue to produce birth defects among residents near the Semipalatinsk Test Site in northeastern Kazakhstan where radioactivity levels are still high, making the uranium legacy a difficult one to embrace.

the hill that women built

On a hill overlooking Kabul, with little access to electricity, women have made their own houses, brick by brick, from the land beneath them. They have created what is known by Afghans as "The Hill That Women Built". Widowed by the violence of the past 15 years, these women were left without the means to take care of their families, let alone a place to live. After 2001, many widows from all over Afghanistan left the shadows of their harsh life for the rumor of a utopia in Kabul made just for them. Now the hill is home to over a thousand women and children.