Afghanistan Today - Tough going

Tough going

Foreign donors and governments have invested billions to build and repair Afghanistan's battered road network. But insecurity, lack of maintenance and natural disasters ensure that getting around isn't easy. Afghanistan Today journalists present a portrait of life on the road in Afghanistan.

by Afghanistan Today journalists , 16.8.2012

The Afghan road network is as perilous as it is volatile, cutting through some of the most dramatic and troubled landscapes in the world. According to the Ministry of Transport, there are over 3,300 kilometres of national highways and more than 25,000 kilometres of mapped regional roads.
(Photo: Sahar Majid)

Major routes like the Kabul-Jalalabad highway hook up peripheral regions to the capital. They are used by thousands of truckers, traders and private drivers each day, despite the risk of harassment by bandits and insurgents throwing up roadblocks and searching passengers for signs of government affiliation. Here, drivers wait by a military base in Paktika Province to offload cargo. Many vehicles carried bullet holes and all the drivers had tales of ambushes and lost friends.
(Photo: Nick Allen)

When vehicles crash or slide off steep roads, chaos can be unleashed. Here a crowd of opportunistic locals funnels valuable fuel from an overturned tanker on the Salang Pass road in Kabul Province.
(Photo: Wafa Wafaurahman)

There are nearly one million vehicles registered in Afghanistan, and business seldom stops for long, regardless of the interruptions. Here, vehicles are diverted along a dust track parallel to the main highway west of Kandahar after an insurgent attack destroyed a convoy of fuel tankers destined for NATO forces.
(Photo: Nick Allen)

Everywhere there are signs of the giant logistics business that keeps both civilian population and military forces supplied in all seasons. Vehicles loaded with water like this pickup truck outside Kabul are a common sight in the summer months.
(Photo: Zafar Shah Rouyee)

Afghan drivers take great pride in their vehicles and often elaborately paint and decorate them, like this typical 'jingle truck'. Named after the jangling array of charms and bells affixed to the bodywork, they are a common sight in the southern and eastern provinces and in Pakistan. Despite their innocent appearance, the vehicles can hide secrets: according to foreign forces, insurgents smuggle weapons and ammunition beneath loads of fruit or firewood, and even transport dead and injured fighters in compartments concealed beneath cargo.
(Photo: Nick Allen)

Given the rigours of the road, it's easy to see why these two took a moment off in the shade of their tanker on a highway near Mazar-e Sharif.
(Photo: Rohullah Rahimi)

The highways are the domain of the truckers, but in many towns motorized passenger rickshaws have become popular. Here, a cluster of the three-wheelers jostles for space in Jalalabad.
(Photo: Mohammad Yasir Sharifi)

Afghanistan's roads are full of imported new vehicles, but sputtering relics of the past are still a common sight. More than two decades after the departure of Moscow's forces, this Soviet-era bus ferries workers from a cement factory in the northern Baghlan Province.
(Photo: Nasrat Parsa)

Uneasy roadfellows: The local population is often resentful of having to yield to military traffic. As a precaution against vehicle-born suicide bombers, civilian vehicles are required to pull over while convoys pass, which can be many times a day on key roads, causing long delays. Here, farmers on a tractor squeeze past British troops on a remote track in Kandahar Province.
(Photo: Nick Allen)