Fariba Nawa

Who is Fariba Nawa?

Fariba Nawa is an Afghan-American freelance journalist who grew up in both Herat and Lashgargah in Afghanistan as well as Fremont, California. She was born in Herat, Afghanistan to a native Afghan family. Her family fled the country during the Soviet invasion in the 1980s. She is trilingual in Persian, Arabic, and English. In 2000 she ventured into Taliban controlled Afghanistan by sneaking into the country through Iran.

Her report "Afghanistan Inc." is one of the main resources used in different media around the globe while debating effectiveness of reconstruction efforts in Afghanistan. She examines the progress of reconstruction, uncovers some examples of where the money has, and has not, gone, how the system of international aid works, and does not, and what it is really like in the villages and cities where outsiders are rebuilding the war-torn countryside.

Her book Opium Nation was published in November 2011. The book is her personal account of the drug trade in Afghanistan and how it has affected the poor and disadvantaged.