Surrounded by his pyramids of fruit and vegetables, Gul Khaliq is a cheerful man. "Thanks to God we have customers, we have security and the people have the money to spend," says the fruit-seller at the main market in Jalalabad, slapping a watermelon and adding a eulogy to the governor of Nangarhar province, Gul Agha Sherzai. Jalalabad and the governor are both on the up. Millions of dollars of foreign aid and a building boom have dragged the place out of torpor. And Mr Sherzai, a bear of a man known as "the Bulldozer", has contrived to make Nangarhar officially "poppy free" this year.
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