A Shining Star in the Middle East

On the Condi Rice visit to Afghanistan:

Hours after rockets were fired at foreign diplomatic facilities and the Afghan security headquarters here, Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice arrived in the Afghan capital Wednesday for talks about ongoing military operations and efforts to stabilize the country's fragile new democracy.

Rice's visit, the first by a senior U.S. official since Afghanistan's parliamentary elections last month, also came as six Afghan soldiers and five Afghan aid workers, including two doctors, were killed in attacks Wednesday blamed on insurgents from the Islamic extremist Taliban militia.

.....Unlike on previous trips to the country, foreign reporters traveling with Rice were compelled to wear bulletproof vests, and armed guards rode with them in buses from the airport to the presidential palace in Kabul.....

Rice Visit to Afghanistan Coincides With Violence