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August 20, 2003
   
Foreign aid groups are spending a larger proportion of their budgets on security, generally by hiring local gunmen to provide protection. This has to be carefully done, for if you hire men from the wrong tribe, you will offend a stronger tribe, that will put the aid group at even greater risk because of the imagined offense. In some cases, paying for security guards is basically an extortion racket. But in most cases, it is just protection from the pro-Taliban thugs in the area. Naturally, the money spent on security is money that cannot be spent on the aid projects.