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WHAT'S NEW ON CORPWATCH
Holding Corporations Accountable
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FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE

Friday, October 31, 2008

CorpWatch and KPFA Radio Launch "Afghanistan 2008: Seven Years After the
Taliban" Multimedia Project Collaboration.

(Berkeley, CA - October 31, 2008) Seven years after the U.S. invaded
Afghanistan to oust the Taliban, the country faces an increasingly uncertain
future. Award-winning investigative journalists Pratap Chatterjee and Nobu
Sakamoto, reported from Afghanistan immediately following the invasion, and now
return to the country as part of a CorpWatch/KPFA Radio collaboration to take
stock.

“As the United States moves towards perhaps the most critical presidential
election in decades, this project aims to bring a spotlight back to both the
human cost of war being borne by the Afghan people, and the gross incompetence
that has plagued the reconstruction effort here – at significant profit to
private military companies like the Louis Berger Group, Dyncorp, and Espial,”
said CorpWatch project director Tonya Hennessey.

In 2006, Afghan American journalist Fariba Nawa returned to her native country
to examine the progress of reconstruction, detailed in the CorpWatch report
“Afghanistan, Inc.” The findings were tragically disheartening. In 2008,
initial observations and interviews show that the situation has continued to
deteriorate.

"The reconstruction of Afghanistan has definitely not met expectations. Our
research is intended to discover why things have gone wrong and what happened
to the money provided for Afghan development," says Pratap Chatterjee, KPFA
reporter and CorpWatch Managing Editor and author of "Iraq, Inc.: A Profitable
Occupation".

In 2007, America's first listener-sponsored radio station KPFA launched the
interactive website Warcomeshome.org, featuring hard-hitting stories about the
Iraq and Afghanistan wars, as well as innovative means of contributing to, and
distributing information about, the impact of the conflict on people in the
United States. "Afghanistan 2008: Seven Years After the Taliban," is the newest
phase of the project, the contents of which are now part of the permanent
collection of the U.S. Library of Congress.

"Seven years after the US and its allies invaded, Afghanistan has become the
forgotten occupation," says KPFA Program Director Sasha Lilley. "KPFA's War
Comes Home project had previously told the story of the costs of the occupation
for U.S. soldiers. Yet even more significant are the costs for the Afghan
people."

In the spirit of CorpWatch’s hard-hitting investigative journalism andKPFA's
tradition of media innovation, Warcomeshome.org allows visitors to listen to
and share stories about the consequences of the Iraq and Afghanistan wars,
using their own blogs, email lists, and social networking sites. The website
features a blog by Chatterjee, as well as audio interviews, photos, video, and
resources for activists.

To learn more about "The War Comes Home: Seven Years After the Taliban," go to
www.Warcomeshome.org.

###

Since 1996 CorpWatch has investigated and exposed corporate violations
of human rights, environmental crimes, fraud and corruption around the
world. It works to foster global justice, independent media activism,
and democratic control over corporations. www.corpwatch.org

Founded in 1949, KPFA is the United States ' first listener-sponsored
radio station. Broadcasting on 94.1 FM in Berkeley , CA , and 88.1 FM
on KFCF in Fresno , KPFA's signal reaches one third of the state of
California . KPFA website, kpfa.org, serves thousands of listeners all
over the world. Much of KPFA's programming is local, original and
eclectic, with a mix of news, arts, and music. www.kpfa.org

Press contacts:

Pratap Chatterjee, CorpWatch Managing Editor
Pratap [at] corpwatch.org, Global Mobile: +1-202-580-8393

Tonya Hennessey, CorpWatch Project Director
tonya [at] corpwatch.org, 510 271-8080, 650 273-2475

Sasha Lilley, KPFA Program Director
ipd [at] kpfa.org, 510 848-6767 ext 209
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