KABUL

Near the epicentre of the quake that struck Afghanistan this week, houses lie in ruins.

India has rushed emergency relief assistance and a technical team to Kabul to coordinate the delivery of humanitarian assistance after a destructive earthquake in eastern Afghanistan.

India sent family tents, blankets and other relief supplies for a team to distribute in eastern Afghan villages where a deadly earthquake collapsed thousands of timber and stone homes to rubble. Pictures of the relief effort were accompanied by a tweet from India’s External Affairs Minister S. Jaishankar: “India, a true first responder.” The supplies total 27 tons delivered over two flights to Afghanistan's capital Kabul, where the United Nations Office for Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs and the Afghan Red Crescent Society will coordinate its distribution, a ministry statement said Friday.

India has sent a technical team to Kabul to coordinate the delivery of humanitarian assistance after a destructive earthquake in eastern Afghanistan.

Overwhelmed residents were digging with bare hands through what used to be their homes, while the Taliban was struggling to coordinate recovery efforts.

Arrests of foreigners by the Taliban began late last year and continued for months as its leadership cracked down on activists and foreigners accused of working in the country without proper documentation.

The Islamic State group has claimed responsibility for an attack on a Sikh temple in Afghanistan’s capital of Kabul that killed at least one worshipper and wounded seven others

Several explosions and gunfire ripped through a Sikh temple in Afghanistan's capital on Saturday morning

A Taliban official says explosions and gunfire have ripped through a Sikh temple in Afghanistan’s capital

The Air Force has concluded that air crew members acted appropriately and were not at fault for some tragic deaths during the chaotic evacuation from Afghanistan last year, when desperate Afghans clung to a military plane as it was taking off and fell to their deaths or were caught in the wheels.

A U.N. agency has issued a glum world forecast, saying that food import bills appear headed to a record high and food markets are likely to tighten.

Taliban forces have been locked for months in an on-again, off-again battle with opposition fighters in the Panjshir Valley.

The largely inconclusive report found it unlikely that former president Ashraf Ghani had taken huge amounts of money but did say that tens of millions were looted.

Indian foreign ministry officials are visiting Kabul for talks with the Taliban and international organizations involved in the distribution of humanitarian assistance in Afghanistan

Pakistan's government on Wednesday sent a 50-member delegation of tribal elders to Kabul to negotiate an extension of a truce with the Pakistani Taliban that expired this week, two security officials said. Talks between the two sides that led to cease-fires in the past have been mediated by the Taliban in Afghanistan. The Pakistani Taliban — known as Tehrik-e-Taliban Pakistan or TTP — are a separate group but allied with the Afghan Taliban, who seized power in their country last August, as the U.S. and NATO troops were in the final stages of their pullout from Afghanistan.

One of the graves had broken open in Kabul’s Nader Shah Hill Cemetery, exposing a near-complete skeleton at the bottom of the pit in the hard earth. The only reason the kids came over, interrupting their soccer game, was to see what an Associated Press photographer was taking pictures of. There are cemeteries all over Afghanistan’s capital, Kabul, many of them filled with the dead from the country’s decades of war.

Enforcers from the Ministry for the Prevention of Vice and Promotion of Virtue are expanding their reach into all aspects of Afghan society.

A series of explosions has shaken Afghanistan, including a blast inside a mosque in the capital of Kabul that killed at least five people and three bombings of minivans in the country’s north that killed nine passengers

Placeholder while article actions loadKABUL — The Taliban is handing over control of the country’s airports to a company based in the United Arab Emirates, according to a statement from the prime minister’s office Tuesday. Advertisement“The international airlines which have been away from this country in the last few months will come back to us,” he told journalists. Afghanistan’s main international airport in Kabul was ransacked in August as the city’s security forces melted away and Taliban fighters took control of the capital. But without fully functioning radar, the insurance costs associated with using the Kabul airport make commercial operations largely unviable. Afghanistan is battling a spiraling economic crisis, and some Taliban officials have called for international investment to ease unemployment and inflation.

Afghanistan’s Taliban rulers have begun enforcing an order requiring all female TV news anchors in the country to cover their faces while on-air.

Afghanistan's biggest media outlet says the country's Taliban rulers have ordered female TV presenters on all TV channels to cover their faces while on air.

Videos show students protesting enforcement of draconian rules the Taliban says are just suggestions, but which seem to be getting even stricter.

Congressional bargainers have announced a deal on legislation to boost health care services and disability benefits for veterans exposed to toxic burn pits in Iraq and Afghanistan.

The country's hardline Islamist rulers say the body was "not considered necessary," as they continue breaking up freedom-oriented institutions.

Forces vowing to liberate the country from the Islamic hardliners say they've launched an offensive, and the bloodshed is already sending civilians fleeing for safety.

Afghan women speak out against compulsory male chaperones and new mandate to wear all-covering veils.

A spate of Islamic State attacks have left Afghan students in fear and test Taliban security claims.

This Seamus Murphy photograph shows just one moment captured during a long relationship with a family in Afghanistan.

Afghanistan’s Taliban leadership has ordered all Afghan women to wear the all-covering burqa in public

Afghanistan’s Taliban leadership has ordered all Afghan women to wear all-covering clothing in public, and threatened to punish their male relatives in cases of noncompliance.

A Taliban spokesman says a powerful explosion at a Sunni mosque in Kabul has killed at least 10 worshippers and wounded 20

The Islamic State affiliate in Afghanistan has claimed responsibility for two bombings in the country’s north that targeted the country’s minority Hazara ethnic group

A spokesman for a Taliban-appointed police chief says two explosions within minutes of each other killed at least nine people and wounded 13 in a key northern city

The US pulled out of Afghanistan in August 2021 as the Taliban resurged to power. It left behind an array of planes, guns, and vehicles.

Pakistan’s army says militants in Afghanistan have fired heavy weapons across the border into a military outpost overnight, killing three personnel

The Islamic State group said it was behind one blast, which tore through a mosque in Mazar-i-Sharif.

An Afghan official says two children in Kabul have been wounded by a roadside bomb

The explosions occurred inside a high school and near an education center. It wasn't immediately clear how many children were there at the time.

The explosions occurred inside a high school and near an education center. It wasn't immediately clear how many children were there at the time.

An Afghan police spokesman says explosions targeting educational institutions in Kabul have killed at least six civilians and injured 17 others.

A Danish aid group has been able to keep its Afghan women employees working, even after the Taliban takeover of the country last August

The head of the United Nations says nearly all Afghans don’t have enough to eat and some have resorted to “selling their children and their body parts” to get money for food.

Afghanistan's Taliban rulers are working to protect ancient Buddha statues in caves carved into cliffsides outside Kabul.

North Korea released a propaganda video a day after the launch of their latest intercontinental ballistic missile.

Madeleine Albright, the first female U.S. secretary of state, dies of cancer at age 84. President Bill Clinton chose Albright as America's top diplomat in 1996, and she served in that capacity for four years. (March 23)

Afghanistan’s Taliban rulers have decided against reopening schools to girls above the sixth grade, reneging on a promise and opting to appease their hard-line base, at the expense of further alienating the international community.

Afghanistan’s Taliban-run Education Ministry has announced that schools for all students will open this week — the clearest sign yet that girls will be allowed back in school.

Schools for all students will open this week, Afghanistan's Taliban-run Education Ministry announced Monday in the clearest sign yet that girls will be allowed back in school. Girls have been denied education beyond Grade 6 since the Taliban swept back into power last August. The international community has been relentless in urging Afghanistan’s Taliban rulers to allow girls to return to school.

Afghan refugees in the U.S. will be allowed to stay for at least 18 months under temporary protected status, a move that'll help some of the thousands who arrived following the American withdrawal from their country.

The head of the U.N. refugee agency is in Kabul to tell Afghans they have not been forgotten — even as the international community scrambles to deal with the devastation of the war in Ukraine and a humanitarian crisis unseen in Europe since World War II

A first group of Afghan refugees have arrived at a new temporary housing facility in Northern Virginia as the U.S. works to resettle people who fled the Taliban takeover of their country.

A female Afghan activist says plans to donate blood to mark International Women’s Day havev been halted by Taliban-appointed hospital staff

The Taliban's acting interior minister says Taliban security police guilty of misconduct in Afghanistan are being penalized after many abuse allegations.

The Taliban acting interior minister — designated a terrorist by the U.S. — said in a rare public appearance Saturday that security police guilty of misconduct in Afghanistan were being penalized after a string of abuse allegations. For the first time, photos showing Sirajuddin Haqqani's face were published by official Taliban government channels. Haqqani was photographed attending the Saturday graduation ceremony of the first class to complete police training since the Taliban assumed control of Afghanistan.

The searches mark a significant shift in how the group enforces security.

Taliban forces have arrested dozens of criminals, kidnappers and smugglers in operations across Kabul, a Taliban government spokesman said on Sunday. The clearance operations began in the capital and neighboring provinces two days ago, and will continue, Zabiullah Mujahid said in a press conference. Mujahid also welcomed a recent U.S. decision to ease restrictions on Afghan banks.

Students have returned to Kabul University, among Afghanistan's oldest and most revered institutions of higher education.

Kabul University, among Afghanistan’s oldest and most revered institutions of higher education, reopened Saturday for the first time since the Taliban takeover six months ago. Dozens of female students, all wearing the hijab, the veil worn by Muslim women, lined up outside the university gate. Taliban stood guard at the campus's three entrances.

UNICEF's top chief says the Taliban have committed to allowing Afghan girls to go to school next month.

The last of thousands of Afghan refugees who awaited resettlement at eight U.S. military installations departed from a New Jersey base on Saturday.

The Taliban stunned the world by marching into Kabul on August 15, 2021, after a lightning offensive that capped a 20-year insurgency against the Western-backed government and the US and allied forces that propped it up. The end of fighting brought relief for many women – but harsh restrictions imposed by the new government are also causing despair. A network of dozens of women – once students, teachers or NGO workers, as well as housewives – have worked in secret to organise protests against the Taliban over the past six months, but are facing increasingly aggressive suppression.

Afghanistan has undergone a dramatic transformation in half a year of Taliban rule

Afghanistan has undergone a dramatic transformation in half a year of Taliban rule.

Afghanistan has undergone a dramatic transformation in half a year of Taliban rule. Tens of thousands of Afghans have fled or have been evacuated, including large numbers of the educated elites. Tuesday marks six months since the Afghan capital of Kabul was ceded to the Taliban with the sudden and secret departure of the country’s U.S.-backed president.

Afghanistan’s former president has called a White House order to unfreeze $3.5 billion in Afghan assets held in the U.S. for families of 9/11 victims an atrocity against the Afghan people.

One of those missing is a former BBC correspondent who's spent decades covering the country, but the Taliban regime is pleading ignorance.

UNHCR says the Taliban freed two foreign journalists working with the U.N. refugee agency and several of the aid organization’s Afghan staff.

The Army investigation into the August 26 Abbey Gate attack at the Kabul airport included interviews with over 130 people.

The August attack took place in the closing days of the U.S. withdrawal from Afghanistan.

The move leaves 140 Afghan semifinalists without access to the prestigious scholarship after almost a year of waiting.

"When the Taliban offers you — a pregnant, unmarried woman — safe haven, you know your situation is messed up," Charlotte Bellis wrote.

America’s chaotic withdrawal from Afghanistan added moral injury to military failure. But a group of soldiers, veterans, and ordinary citizens came together to try to save Afghan lives and salvage some American honor.

The United Nations secretary-general says the world body has received “credible allegations” that more than 100 former members of the Afghan government, its security forces and those who worked with international troops have been killed since the Taliban takeover of the country on Aug. 15.

The Pentagon has declassified and publicly released video footage of a U.S. drone strike in Kabul that killed 10 civilians in the final hours of a chaotic American withdrawal that ended a 20-year war in Afghanistan.

The International Labor Organization says more than a half million people in Afghanistan have lost their jobs since the Taliban takeover in mid-August.

Afghanistan's former president says he had just minutes to decide to flee in the hours before the Taliban took control of the capital in August.

The Taliban have dissolved Afghanistan’s two election commissions as well as state ministries for peace and parliamentarian affairs.

For Afghanistan, 2021 was punctuated by the chaos of a U.S. withdrawal and an uncertain next chapter.

Russian military transport planes have delivered a shipment of humanitarian supplies to Afghanistan and flew back 200 Russians, Afghan students and others.

The Afghan survivors of an errant U.S. drone strike that killed 10 members of their family in August say they are frustrated and saddened that U.S. troops involved in the attack will not face disciplinary action.

A whistleblower has alleged that Britain’s Foreign Office abandoned many of the nation’s allies in Afghanistan and left them to the mercy of the Taliban during the fall of the capital, Kabul, because of a dysfunctional and arbitrary evacuation effort.

The National Museum of Afghanistan is open once again and the Taliban, whose members once smashed their way through the facility, now appear to be among its most enthusiastic visitors.

Through clouds of billowing dust, two men circle each other warily before one plunges forward, grabbing his rival’s clothing.

Human Rights Watch says that Afghanistan's Taliban fighters have killed or forcibly “disappeared” more than 100 former police and intelligence officers since taking power in mid-August.

The evacuation of American citizens and others from Afghanistan didn’t end with the departure of the last U.S. troops on Aug. 30.

More than 100 Afghans believed to have been at risk from the Taliban have been granted temporary shelter in Greece after being evacuated on a special flight to the northern city of Thessaloniki.

Police say a roadside bomb has exploded on a busy avenue in the Afghan capital Kabul, wounding two people.

A growing number of near-starving children are brought every day to the main children's hospital in the Afghan capital, Kabul.

The Taliban-run Afghan public health ministry has announced the start of a four-day nationwide polio vaccination campaign aimed at inoculating children under age 5.

An independent Pentagon review has concluded that the U.S. drone strike that killed innocent Kabul civilians and children in the final days of the Afghanistan war was not caused by misconduct or negligence, and it doesn’t recommend any disciplinary action.

An official from the Taliban-run Defense Ministry in Kabul says six suicide bombers set off an explosion at the entrance of a Kabul military hospital and tried to enter the facility, but were pushed back by Taliban guards.

The U.S. Defense Department said Friday that it is committed to offering condolence payments to relatives of the 10 people who were killed in an errant U.S. drone strike in Kabul, Afghanistan, in August.

Afghanistan’s Taliban leaders have met with U.K. officials for the first time since taking power, a move the group hopes will pave the way for the country to refill cash-starved coffers as it teeters on the brink of economic collapse.

Taliban forces have raided an Islamic State affiliate’s hideout in the Afghan capital and killed several insurgents, hours after a bombing outside a mosque.

The Taliban say at least five civilians have been killed by a bomb blast at the entrance of a mosque in the Afghan capital of Kabul.

The head of the Taliban government has ordered the group's fighters to leave private homes they had taken over as they blitzed across Afghanistan in August.

Defense Secretary Lloyd Austin and Gen. Mark Milley are scheduled to appear before the House Armed Services Committee to review the war in Afghanistan.

Female Afghan health workers, teachers and rights defenders are urging the international community to resume financial aid to Afghanistan, saying non-payment has disproportionally impacted women.

The Taliban have banned barbershops in a southern Afghanistan province from shaving or trimming beards, claiming their edict is in line with Shariah, or Islamic, law.

Russia's foreign minister says the United States, China, Russia and Pakistan are working together to ensure that Afghanistan’s new Taliban rulers keep their promises, especially to form a genuinely representative government and prevent the spread of extremist groups.