Services remain in dire need: NGOs

KABUL, Afghanistan - In the decade since foreign forces and billions of dollars of aid arrived in Afghanistan, the quality of the war-torn country's health and education services remains poor and in dire need of improvement, aid groups said on Friday.

Progress had been made in setting up hospitals, clinics and schools and making education available to women.

But a lack of medicine, textbooks and experienced teachers and doctors meant Afghans were still suffering 10 years after the Islamist Taliban regime was toppled, according to a report by ACBAR, an umbrella group of non-governmental organizations in Afghanistan.