Afghanistan-Pakistan

Zawahiri's rise puts Pakistan in al Qaida crosshairs

Ayman al Zawahiri's succession to the leadership of al Qaida, announced over the Internet Thursday, carries particular dangers for Pakistan, a nuclear-armed country reeling from an Islamic insurgency, a faltering economy, endemic corruption and poor governance. | 06/16/11 19:14:20 By - Saeed Shah and Jonathan S. Landay

Even hawkish Rep. Dicks seeks end to Afghan war

If you need proof that the tide on Capitol Hill has turned against the war in Afghanistan, Exhibit A is Rep. Norm Dicks of Washington state, the top-ranked House Democrat in charge of the Pentagon's budget. | 06/16/11 19:11:56 By - Rob Hotakainen

Ayman al-Zawahiri succeeds bin Laden as al Qaida's leader

Al Qaida moved Thursday to fill the leadership vacuum caused by the death of Osama bin Laden, announcing that his deputy Ayman al-Zawahiri has taken over. | 06/16/11 06:44:29 By - Saeed Shah

Arrests in Pakistan may include neighbor who lived behind bin Laden

U.S. and Pakistani officials acknowledged Wednesday that Pakistan has arrested several of its own citizens who helped the CIA spy on the house where Osama bin Laden lived. | 06/16/11 06:33:09 By - Saeed Shah

Afghan vice president unhurt in attack on police academy

Afghanistan's second vice president and the country's interior minister were uninjured Wednesday when Taliban insurgents fired a mortar at the opening ceremony of a vast new police training academy outside Kabul. | 06/16/11 06:32:05 By - Hashim Shukoor

Afghanistan-Pakistan peace commission meets

A joint Afghanistan-Pakistan peace commission met for the first time Saturday, an initiative to try to settle the near-decade-long insurgency in Afghanistan. But analysts are skeptical of results from the unwieldy body, and the process is further undermined by Washington's opaque position on negotiations. | 06/13/11 10:59:09 By - Saeed Shah

At least 21 killed in Afghanistan attacks

At least 21 people were killed in a series of attacks across Afghanistan on Saturday as a U.N. agency announced that May had been the deadliest month for Afghan civilians since 2007. | 06/13/11 10:58:47 By - Hashim Shukoor

Ex-top Pakistan spy doubts bin Laden hid years in Abbottabad

The man who took charge of Pakistan's intelligence agency after the Sept. 11, 2001, terrorist attacks said Wednesday that he wasn't surprised that Osama bin Laden had been living in his country but that he doubted the al Qaida leader had been hiding out for five years in the compound where he died. | 06/10/11 07:20:12 By - Carol Rosenberg

Zawahiri praises bin Laden, but al Qaida still leaderless

Egyptian radical Ayman al Zawahiri on Wednesday issued his first statement since U.S. special forces killed al Qaida leader Osama bin Laden in Pakistan. In a video, Zawahiri promised to carry on the al Qaida founder's war against the West. | 06/10/11 07:19:49 By - Carol Rosenberg

Angry Pakistani army says it doesn't want U.S. aid

Pakistan's army lashed out Thursday at its critics at home as well as in the United States in an angry statement that underscored just how deep a crisis the country's armed forces are suffering. | 06/09/11 19:24:32 By - Saeed Shah

As U.S. pullout nears, Taliban bombs undermine Afghan army

A six-week-old Taliban offensive that's struck some of the most peaceful parts of Afghanistan and killed police commanders and senior officials is undermining confidence in the Afghan army and police just as the Obama administration considers how quickly it should begin drawing down U.S. forces here. | 06/09/11 18:10:25 By - Hashim Shukoor

Pressure grows on Obama to rethink Afghan war policy

As he mulls how many U.S. troops to pull out of Afghanistan starting next month, President Barack Obama is coming under increasing pressure from Democratic lawmakers and a growing number of Republicans to re-examine his war strategy following Osama bin Laden's death. | 06/08/11 19:11:18 By - Jonathan S. Landay, Nancy A. Youssef and William Douglas

U.S. general in charge of Afghan training gives upbeat update

The commander of the NATO training mission in Afghanistan painted an optimistic picture Tuesday of the progress in training Afghan security forces, a crucial pillar of President Barack Obama's plans to begin withdrawing American forces from that country in July. | 06/07/11 18:39:47 By - Daniel Lippman

Pushed by voters, senators to debate U.S. role in Libya

Responding to growing concern among war-weary constituents about the purpose and cost of the U.S. mission in Libya, senators are poised to debate whether to send President Barack Obama a message that he needs to be more specific about his goals there. | 06/07/11 17:35:27 By - David Lightman and William Douglas

Gates urges Afghans to take more security responsibilities

Secretary of Defense Robert Gates made an unannounced visit here Saturday and said that Afghan security forces must take more responsibilities for a successful transition from U.S.-led NATO forces starting this July. | 06/04/11 17:07:41 By - Hashim Shukoor

Top al Qaida figure Ilyas Kashmiri killed in drone strike

Ilyas Kashmiri was one of the most wanted militants in the world, carrying a $5 million American bounty on his head and charged in Chicago with planning an attack on a Danish newspaper. His was one of the names on a list U.S. officials delivered to Pakistan of top terrorists they wanted Pakistan's help in hunting down. | 06/04/11 12:19:47 By - Saeed Shah

Pakistan's bin Laden probe falters before it even starts

A month after U.S. Navy SEALs shot and killed Osama bin Laden, Pakistan's investigation into how the al Qaida leader hid out here undetected for at least five years has hit major stumbling blocks even before it has begun, leaving politicians and analysts to wonder whether Pakistan will ever get to the bottom of the affair. | 06/03/11 06:33:53 By - Saeed Shah

Journalist who feared Pakistani spy agency found dead

The tortured corpse of a prominent Pakistani journalist, who'd told friends he feared that the country's military intelligence agency would kill him, was found Tuesday, two days after he disappeared. Syed Saleem Shahzad, 40, often produced stories that embarrassed Pakistan's military and its Inter-Services Intelligence spy agency. | 05/31/11 18:02:49 By - Saeed Shah

Karzai tells NATO to stop airstrikes in Afghanistan

Afghan President Hamid Karzai, angered by an airstrike that Afghan officials said killed 14 civilians over the weekend, demanded Tuesday that the U.S.-led coalition halt aerial strikes on Afghan houses and threatened to take unspecified actions if the coalition doesn't comply. | 05/31/11 16:02:36 By - Hashim Shukoor

Where the memories of bin Laden aren't all bad

Unlike the near universal hatred Osama bin Laden's name provokes in the West, the emotions in Afghanistan, where he once lived, are much more nuanced. Bin Laden's former neighbors are more likely to remember him as a hero of the war against the Soviet Union than a terrorist leader who killed more Muslims than Westerners in his long campaign against the infidel. | 05/29/11 17:48:40 By - Hashim Shukoor

Bomb kills key Afghan general, 2 advisers from NATO

A suicide bomber claimed the life of one of Afghanistan's most renown anti-Taliban commanders Saturday in a brazen strike that also killed a provincial police chief, two NATO soldiers and narrowly missed killing the German general who commands NATO troops in northern Afghanistan. The explosion, which also wounded the governor of Takhar province, took place at about 4 p.m. as the men were leaving what the governor's spokesman described as a high-level security meeting in the governor's compound. | 05/28/11 12:22:59 By - Hashim Shukoor

Clinton: Pakistanis concede bin Laden had support network

Secretary of State Hillary Clinton said Friday that Pakistani officials had conceded that al Qaida leader Osama bin Laden must have had a support network in Pakistan to have remained undetected for at least five years in the city of Abbottabad, home to the country's premier military academy. | 05/27/11 17:16:34 By - Saeed Shah

Transcript: Hillary Clinton and Mike Mullen in Pakistan

Secretary of State Hillary Rodham Clinton and Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff Admiral Mike Mullen at the U.S. Embassy in Islamabad. | 05/27/11 15:40:19 By -

House Democrats clamor for U.S. to speed withdrawal from Afghanistan

Though the bid to force Obama to expedite the U.S. exit failed by a surprisingly close 215 to 204 vote — with mostly Democrats but also a sizeable number of Republicans voting for it — it was clear from the debate and vote that Obama's party is growing restless as the 2012 campaign approaches. | 05/26/11 15:03:51 By - David Lightman and William Douglas

House debate reflects U.S. impatience with Afghan War

As the House of Representatives engaged Wednesday in a tense debate over U.S. policy in Afghanistan, the first since the death of Osama bin Laden, some lawmakers in each party called for a quicker exit of U.S. troops, reflecting that the public mood toward American involvement there is growing impatient. | 05/25/11 18:48:19 By - David Lightman and William Douglas

Rumors swirl as Afghans say Taliban's Mullah Omar has moved

The Afghan Taliban on Monday denied reports that their leader, Mullah Mohammad Omar, one of the most wanted men in Afghanistan, had been killed, as Afghan authorities said that he'd disappeared from Quetta, Pakistan, where he's thought to have spent the last 10 years hiding out. | 05/23/11 16:02:46 By - Hashim Shukoor

Taliban raid on naval base raises new questions about Pakistan's military

The ability of only six armed extremists to storm a Pakistani navy base in the city of Karachi and hold out for 16 hours raised new fears Monday about the security of the country’s military installations, including its nuclear weapons sites. It was an ignominious attack for Pakistan's armed forces, coming three weeks after the American raid that killed Osama bin Laden. | 05/23/11 10:38:51 By - Saeed Shah

U.S. returns Guantanamo detainee's remains to Afghanistan

The military has repatriated to Afghanistan the remains of a 47-year-old Guantánamo captive who apparently committed suicide with a bed sheet at a prison camp for compliant captives. | 05/23/11 06:54:15 By - Carol Rosenberg

At least four killed in attack on Pakistani naval base

A squad of heavily armed extremists stormed a Pakistani naval base late Sunday, leading to rocket fire and a gun battle, killing at least four naval personnel, reports and officials said. | 05/22/11 18:44:51 By - Saeed Shah

Suicide bombers storm government building in Afghanistan Khost province

At least four gunmen equipped with arms and explosive vests stormed a government building in the eastern province of Khost on Sunday morning, triggering several hours of clashes with security forces, local officials said. | 05/22/11 16:03:17 By - Hashim Shukoor

Suicide bomber kills 6 in Afghanistan hospital explosion

A midday explosion Saturday caused by a suicide bomber inside the Kabul's main military hospital killed six and injured dozens of others, officials said. Taliban militants claimed credit for the attack shortly after noon, saying two of their suicide bombers entered the hospital. | 05/21/11 13:16:53 By - Hashim Shukoor

U.S. officials escape bin Laden revenge bombing in Pakistan

Two American officials were saved by their armored vehicle Friday when it was hit by a bomb in the northwestern city of Peshawar, in an apparent revenge attack for the killing of Osama bin Laden. | 05/20/11 07:09:59 By - Saeed Shah

Taliban attack in eastern Afghanistan leaves 35 dead

Taliban insurgents attacked a construction company in Afghanistan's Paktia province Thursday, killing 35 and wounding at least 20 others. | 05/19/11 11:44:49 By - Hashim Shukoor

Day that claims 28 lives shows range of Afghan violence

At least 28 people died in Afghanistan on Wednesday in three separate explosions of violence that illustrate the wide array of mayhem that wracks this country and the anger that surrounds U.S. actions here. | 05/18/11 10:13:59 By - Hashim Shukoor

Pakistan says it's arrested an al Qaida figure

Pakistan said Tuesday that it had arrested an al Qaida operative in the southern city of Karachi, the first arrest of a terrorism suspect since an American special forces raid killed Osama bin Laden deep inside the country on May 2. | 05/18/11 06:35:42 By - Saeed Shah

U.S., Pakistan take steps to ease tensions after Osama bin Laden raid

After two weeks of rising acrimony, U.S. and Pakistani officials moved Monday to smooth over tensions triggered by the May 2 Navy SEAL raid that killed Osama bin Laden. | 05/16/11 18:23:02 By - Saeed Shah and Jonathan S. Landay

Pakistan's spy chief: U.S. continually lets us down

A double suicide bombing Friday against a paramilitary security force claimed at least 80 lives in north west Pakistan, an attack that extremists declared was revenge for the killing of Osama bin Laden in the country. | 05/13/11 08:37:43 By - Saeed Shah

Even after bin Laden, U.S. can't walk away from Pakistan

If Pakistani officials helped hide Osama bin Laden, there are unlikely to be serious consequences because the government is too weak and the United States has bigger priorities, such as ending the Afghan war and helping to stabilize poor, terrorism-plagued Pakistan, which has the world's fastest-growing nuclear arsenal. | 05/11/11 21:08:07 By - Jonathan S. Landay and Saeed Shah

U.S. commander: Bin Laden's death doesn't end Afghan war

Osama bin Laden's death hasn't changed the U.S. military mission in Afghanistan, and it must continue, the U.S. commander in charge of the country's east said Tuesday. | 05/10/11 19:01:11 By - Nancy A. Youssef

Obama calls for explanation of bin Laden's network in Pakistan

President Barack Obama, in an interview broadcast on Sunday, demanded to know what kind of "support network" Osama bin Laden had in Pakistan, adding to the pressure on Pakistan's government to explain the al Qaida chief's presence in the country. | 05/09/11 07:08:21 By - Saeed Shah

Suspected Taliban fighters launch attacks on Kandahar

Insurgents staged a major raid on the Afghan city of Kandahar on Saturday. | 05/09/11 06:39:37 By - Hashim Shukoor

Pentagon releases videos of bin Laden found at Pakistan home

The Pentagon has released videos of Osama bin Laden that are part of the intelligence it collected in the raid on Pakistan that killed him. | 05/09/11 06:39:13 By - Nancy A. Youssef

Fighting enters second day in Afghan city of Kandahar

Taliban militants equipped with explosives vests and guns fought for a second day on Sunday in the southern city of Kandahar, targeting government and military compounds from commercial buildings. | 05/09/11 06:33:44 By - Hashim Shukoor

Taliban: Reports of bin Laden's death greatly exaggerated

Afghanistan's Taliban, who sheltered Osama bin Laden when they governed the country prior to the Sept. 11, 2001, terrorist attacks, said Tuesday that it would be "premature" to comment on U.S. claims that the al Qaida leader had been killed during a raid on a compound in Pakistan. | 05/03/11 17:24:20 By - Hashim Shukoor

A world without bin Laden already a world long gone

Without him, there would likely be no Department of Homeland Security, no Patriot Act, no Quran-burning pastors. Had Osama bin Laden never been born, there would surely be fewer gold star mothers and fathers, less need for prosthetic limbs for young troops, an American public still largely ignorant to the Muslim concept of martyrdom. | 05/02/11 21:10:28 By - Scott Canon and Rick Montgomery

Pakistan, Afghanistan ties will change post-bin Laden

Osama bin Laden's death is likely to alter U.S. relations with Pakistan profoundly, and may open a door to negotiations with the Taliban in Afghanistan, according to lawmakers in Congress and analysts of the war on terror. | 05/02/11 18:33:25 By - William Douglas and David Lightman

Afghans: Bin Laden raid shows Pakistan should be war's focus

Afghans used the death of Osama bin Laden to plead for the end of the war in their country, saying the killing of the al Qaida leader in Pakistan proves that Pakistan, not Afghanistan, is where the war needs to be fought. | 05/02/11 14:42:50 By - Hashim Shukoor

Bin Laden raid years in the making, minutes in execution

It took years for the U.S. military to track Osama bin Laden down, finding him not in a cave in the inaccessible tribal regions of Pakistan, but in a sumptuous luxury compound built just six years ago in the same city that is home to Pakistan's most prestigious military academy. The raid that killed him lasted just 40 minutes. | 05/02/11 03:08:42 By - Jonathan S. Landay

We got the bastard: Graham, Biden share news of bin Laden's death

Vice President Joe Biden and Sen. Lindsey Graham, old-style politicians who wear their emotions on their sleeves, traveled the world together when Biden served in the Senate. Graham guessed why Biden might be calling him at home on a Sunday night. | 05/02/11 01:37:21 By - James Rosen

Bin Laden's violent legacy stretches back decades

Osama bin Laden earned his combat spurs by fighting with Afghanistan's ragtag Mujahadeen army to drive occupying Soviet troops out of their homeland in the 1980s. Bin Laden, though, had a far bigger vision, one that would lead him to be reviled by Western civilization. | 05/02/11 01:08:17 By - Greg Gordon

Transcript: Remarks by President Obama on Osama bin Laden

Tonight, President Obama addressed the Nation to announce that the United States has killed Osama bin Laden, the leader of al Qaida. | 05/02/11 00:39:20 By -

Osama bin Laden: Born into privilege, died the face of evil

The tall, lean, rich man's son could have spent his life lounging about Saudi Arabia in luxury. Instead, Osama bin Laden chose to kill. As a young man, he shot at Soviet invaders in Afghanistan. In middle age, he turned his wrath and far-reaching resources against the United States — the superpower he saw as spoiler of his homeland's sacred cities. By the time of his death, his was the face of terrorism. | 05/02/11 00:06:39 By - Rick Montgomery and Scott Canon

President Obama: U.S. kills Osama bin Laden in Pakistan

Osama Bin Laden is dead. President Barack Obama made the dramatic late-night announcement Sunday from the East Room of the White House, ending the long, elusive international manhunt for the leader of the al Qaida terror organization responsible for the Sept. 11, 2001, attacks. "Justice has been done," the president said in a 10-minute address shortly before midnight. | 05/01/11 22:47:13 By - Margaret Talev and Jonathan S. Landay

Suicide bomber, 12, kills 4 in southeastern Afghanistan

A 12-year-old suicide bomber wearing an explosive vest detonated himself Sunday in a market in southeastern Afghanistan's Paktika province, killing four people, including a local council chief, provincial government officials said. | 05/01/11 15:18:32 By - Hashim Shukoor

Taliban to launch offensive Sunday against U.S. forces

The Taliban on Sunday will begin a spring offensive against the U.S.-led coalition in Afghanistan, a statement posted on the insurgent group's website said. Violence has increased across Afghanistan as the U.S.-led NATO forces are preparing to transfer security responsibilities to Afghan forces starting this summer. | 04/30/11 17:28:03 By - Hashim Shukoor

Taliban strike Pakistani security forces, killing 5

Taliban militants in Pakistan extended their campaign of violence against the country’s security forces Thursday, targeting the navy for the third time this week with a bombing that killed five in the southern city of Karachi. | 04/28/11 09:04:13 By - Saeed Shah

In deadliest attack in years, Afghan pilot kills 9 U.S. trainers

An Afghan military pilot opened fire Wednesday on U.S.-led NATO troops at the airport here, killing eight soldiers and a civilian contractor, in the deadliest single attack on international forces in years. | 04/27/11 07:54:08 By - Hashim Shukoor

Airstrike kills top al Qaida leader in Afghanistan, NATO says

U.S.-led NATO forces killed a top al Qaida member, Abu Hafs al Najdi, also known as Abdul Ghani, in an airstrike April 13 in the eastern province of Kunar, according to a statement the International Security Assistance Force issued Tuesday. | 04/26/11 07:05:03 By - Hashim Shukoor

Manhunt on for hundreds of Taliban sprung from Afghan jail

U.S.-backed Afghan forces launched a massive manhunt Monday for hundreds of inmates, most of them Taliban fighters, who fled down a tunnel burrowed under the walls of a maximum security prison. | 04/25/11 08:59:25 By - Hashim Shukoor

Pakistan-U.S. feud boils over CIA drone strikes

Even as it publicly demands an end to U.S. drone attacks on militants in its tribal area, Pakistan is allowing the CIA to launch the missile-firing robot aircraft from an airbase in its province of Baluchistan, U.S. officials said Friday. | 04/22/11 19:52:57 By - Jonathan S. Landay

Bomb kills 5 border police in southern Afghanistan

At least five border policemen were killed and one wounded when a roadside bomb struck their vehicle in the southern province of Kandahar, officials said Friday. There was no immediate claim of responsibility, but Taliban militants mostly have been blamed — or take credit — for other recent attacks. | 04/22/11 12:59:32 By - Hashim Shukoor

Bomb kills 5 border police in southern Afghanistan

At least five border policemen were killed and one wounded when a roadside bomb struck their vehicle in the southern province of Kandahar, officials said Friday. There was no immediate claim of responsibility, but Taliban militants mostly have been blamed — or take credit — for other recent attacks. | 04/22/11 12:44:39 By - Hashim Shukoor

Pakistan frees 5 accused in court-ordered gang rape

Nine years after being gang-raped on the orders of a village council, Mukhtar Mai's struggle for justice ended Thursday when Pakistan's Supreme Court ordered five of the six accused to be freed. | 04/21/11 16:30:41 By - Saeed Shah

Mullen accuses Pakistan of keeping terrorist links

The top uniformed American military official used an interview on Pakistani television Wednesday to accuse the country's spy agency of supporting a leading Afghan insurgent group that's killing U.S. troops in Afghanistan. | 04/20/11 17:36:18 By - Saeed Shah and Jonathan S. Landay

Taliban sympathizer kills 2 at Afghan defense ministry

For the second time in three days, a Taliban suicide bomber in an Afghan army uniform on Monday penetrated a supposedly secure Afghan military facility, the latest evidence that military and government supporters are at risk even inside the most heavily guarded locations. | 04/18/11 22:40:07 By - Hashim Shukoor

8 soldiers die Saturday in latest Taliban suicide attacks

Eight soldiers from the U.S.-led coalition were killed Saturday in Taliban bombings, including a suicide attack at a military base in the eastern province of Laghman, the single deadliest attack on the alliance in months. | 04/16/11 08:23:35 By - Hashim Shukoor

Son's death in Quran burning protest haunts Afghan family

Habibullah remembers the last time he saw his 18-year-old son. It was a Friday morning, the first day of April, and his son, a high school student, wanted to go to the city to buy some clothes and a cellphone. | 04/15/11 15:52:46 By - Hashim Shukoor

Suicide attacks target Afghan police, killing 3

Another suspected Taliban suicide attacker struck in Afghanistan's eastern provinces Thursday, this time claiming the lives of three police officers at a training center that U.S. and Afghan officials set up in hopes of providing police support to isolated villages. | 04/14/11 10:44:58 By - Hashim Shukoor

Karzai blasts 'foreign agents' for Afghan suicide attack

Afghan President Hamid Karzai offered a scarcely veiled condemnation of Pakistan for a suicide bombing that killed at least 10 government-allied tribal leaders and wounded seven. No group claimed the attack, which struck the leaders as they emerged from a meeting on local issues. | 04/13/11 07:48:20 By - Hashim Shukoor

Misconduct ignored in Afghan Stryker killings

Lt. Roman Ligsay already was feeling pressure to keep a close eye on his platoon in southern Afghanistan. Then a superior officer questioned why Ligsay’s soldiers had shot and killed a seemingly unarmed Afghan walking toward them along a highway. | 04/11/11 15:29:24 By - Adam Ashton

U.S. troops repel Taliban attack at eastern Afghan airport

An insurgent attack at the airport in the eastern city of Jalalabad late Tuesday left at least seven militants dead in the latest sign that the Taliban are stepping up assaults as the weather warms. The attack came shortly before midnight as the provincial governor met with other officials at the airport to discuss security. U.S. troops are based at the airport. | 04/06/11 09:19:54 By - Hashim Shukoor

Former Afghan lawmaker Joya says U.S. soldiers disregard lives

A former Afghan lawmaker told an audience of Tacoma, Washington, peace activists Tuesday that photos of Joint Base Lewis-McChord soldiers grinning over the corpse of a boy they allegedly murdered revealed a disregard for civilian lives among U.S. forces fighting in her country. | 04/06/11 07:41:20 By - Adam Ashton

California soldier honored for saving Afghan girl's life

Pvt. Marcus Montez's first patrol during his inaugural tour as a combat medic in Afghanistan wasn't your typical first day. While on foot patrol through Kandahar City, his unit heard an Afghan woman wailing in distress and rushed to investigate. His four-person unit found a woman clutching an apparently lifeless toddler. Montez, of Sacramento, stepped in and began performing CPR on the little girl. For this, Montez was awarded the Soldier's Medal, the highest award a soldier can receive for actions unrelated to combat. | 04/06/11 06:45:30 By - Ed Fletcher

White House: Pakistan is failing to defeat militants

In a grim assessment of the war on terror inside Pakistan, the Obama administration said Tuesday that Pakistan lacks a "clear path toward defeating" Islamic insurgents in the country's tribal region despite committing tens of thousands of troops to the effort. | 04/05/11 20:58:29 By - Jonathan S. Landay

Afghans complain about NATO-led raid that killed 6

A night raid by NATO-led forces killed six civilians in the relatively peaceful northern Afghan province of Sar-e-Pul, local officials said Tuesday, but a statement from the U.S.-led coalition said the dead were Taliban insurgents armed with AK-47 assault rifles. | 04/05/11 16:13:58 By - Hashim Shukoor

Nine killed in Afghan protest over Quran burning

A second day of deadly violence over the burning of a Quran by a Florida pastor left at least nine people dead and more than 80 injured Saturday in Afghanistan. | 04/04/11 06:22:31 By - Hashim Shukoor

Truck bomb kills 20, injures dozens in eastern Afghanistan

A truck filled with explosives targeted a road construction compound in Afghanistan's eastern province of Paktika, killing at least 20 people and wounding dozens more Sunday, according to a statement Monday by the Afghan Interior Mministry. | 03/28/11 06:35:47 By - Hashim Shukoor

Taliban insurgents abduct police recruits in eastern Afghanistan

Taliban militants have abducted about 50 young men who were planning to join the national police in the eastern province of Kunar, security officials said Sunday. | 03/27/11 18:36:12 By - Hashim Shukoor

Stryker soldier Morlock gets 24-year sentence for Afghan killings

Spc. Jeremy Morlock said Wednesday he lost his “moral compass” when he joined schemes to murder three Afghan civilians last year during a deployment with a Joint Base Lewis-McChord Stryker brigade. | 03/24/11 07:04:58 By - Adam Ashton

Stryker soldier, Morlock, pleads guilty to Afghan murders

Spc. Jeremy Morlock pleaded guilty Wednesday morning to three counts of murdering unarmed Afghans and other wrongdoing in an important juncture in a U.S. Army war-crimes investigation. | 03/23/11 15:05:05 By - Hal Bernton

Start of Afghan 'fighting season' will test U.S. strategy

After the most violent winter since U.S. soldiers arrived in Afghanistan, the spring thaw has come, ushering in a new "fighting season" in which, intelligence suggests, the Taliban leadership believes they will storm back into their former strongholds in the south and reverse the much-trumpeted gains of U.S.-led coalition forces. | 03/23/11 07:43:07 By - Saeed Shah

Karzai lays out plan for Afghan security handover

The Afghan government announced Tuesday that U.S.-led international forces will hand over security responsibility in three provinces to Afghan forces beginning this summer. | 03/22/11 19:11:31 By - Hashim Shukoor

Rep. Walter Jones pushes for Afghanistan exit

Again last Saturday, U.S. Rep. Walter Jones slipped into his office for the penance he has served nearly each weekend since 2005. Again on Thursday, the House of Representatives turned its attention to the conflict in Afghanistan, and whether it is the time for U.S. troops to leave. | 03/18/11 06:38:53 By - Barbara Barrett

Pakistan condemns U.S. over drone strike that killed 36

Just one day after a CIA contractor was absolved by a Pakistani court of a double murder charge, Pakistan and U.S. relations were plunged into a new crisis Thursday over a CIA-directed drone missile strike that Pakistan said killed at least 36 civilians. | 03/17/11 17:56:30 By - Saeed Shah

Lawyer: 'Blood money' bought CIA contractor's freedom

A murder case against an American CIA contractor that had threatened already troubled U.S.-Pakistani relations came to an abrupt end Wednesday after $1.4 million in "blood money" was paid to the families of the two men he was accused of killing. | 03/16/11 09:12:04 By - Saeed Shah and Jonathan S. Landay

Suicide attacker targets recruiting center in Kunduz province

A suicide attacker blew himself up in an army recruiting center in the northern Afghanistan province of Kunduz, killing at least 30 and injured 40 others on Monday officials said. | 03/14/11 08:53:35 By - Hashim Shukoor

Coalition raid kills Afghan President Karzai's cousin

A cousin of President Hamid Karzai was killed Thursday in southern Afghanistan during a raid by coalition forces, just after the president had said civilian casualties from the war were damaging relations with the United States. | 03/10/11 17:09:41 By - Saeed Shah

U.N.: U.S.-led forces killed fewer Afghan civilians last year

The number of civilians killed by U.S.-led forces and their Afghan allies dropped 26 percent last year, the United Nations reported Wednesday. | 03/09/11 15:46:51 By - Saeed Shah

Afghans rely heavily on foreign advisers as transition looms

Nearly 300 foreign advisers, most of them Americans, work at Afghanistan's Interior Ministry, and hundreds more work in other government departments, a reliance on foreign expertise that raises doubts about the viability of the West's exit strategy. | 03/08/11 17:27:02 By - Saeed Shah

Afghan government asks U.N. to ease limits on 5 ex-Taliban

The Afghan government has asked the United Nations to remove the names of five former senior Taliban members from its terrorist blacklist, including the man who ran the extremist regime's feared religious police, McClatchy has learned. | 03/07/11 17:13:14 By - Saeed Shah

Relations worsen as Karzai rejects U.S. apology over deaths of 9 Afghan boys

Afghan president Hamid Karzai Sunday rebuffed an apology by the American general running the military campaign in his country for the recent deaths of nine boys in a helicopter attack, sending already tense relations with Washington to a new low. | 03/06/11 16:42:48 By - Saeed Shah

5th soldier convicted in Afghan Stryker trials

The Army won its fifth conviction Wednesday in its Afghanistan war crimes investigation at Joint Base Lewis-McChord, but defense attorneys launched an aggressive offensive against key prosecution witnesses that likely will be repeated as the case unfolds. | 03/03/11 12:56:20 By - Adam Ashton

Obama statement on assassination of Pakistan minister

I am deeply saddened by the assassination of Pakistan's Minister for Minority Affairs Shahbaz Bhatti today in Islamabad, and condemn in the strongest possible terms this horrific act of violence. We offer our profound condolences to his family, loved ones and all who knew and worked with him. | 03/02/11 18:00:58 By -

U.S.-led coalition admits it killed 9 Afghan boys in error

Troops in attack helicopters that belong to the U.S.-led coalition in Afghanistan mistakenly killed nine boys Tuesday with machine-gun and rocket fire as they collected firewood, thinking that the children were Taliban insurgents, the international forces acknowledged Wednesday. | 03/02/11 16:54:14 By - Hashim Shukoor

Another top Pakistan politician slain over blasphemy law

only Christian in Pakistan's cabinet was assassinated Wednesday by militants linked to al Qaida after he called for the country's controversial laws on blasphemy to be amended. | 03/02/11 05:49:43 By - Saeed Shah

New militia brings security, and worries, to Marjah, Afghanistan

Namatullah, a 19-year-old volunteer for a new armed "neighborhood watch" militia now patrolling alongside Marines in northeast Marjah, simply drew his finger across his throat when asked why he and other residents hadn't banded together to protect their districts until the arrival of the U.S. soldiers. | 03/01/11 17:17:19 By - Saeed Shah

Suicide bomber kills three at Afghan sporting event

A suicide bomber detonated Saturday in a crowd in northern Afghanistan gathered for a traditional sporting event, killing three and injuring 40. | 02/27/11 20:29:39 By - Hashim Shukoor

Karzai succeeds in getting weak parliament speaker elected

President Hamid Karzai managed Sunday to avoid the election of a strong opposition politician to the post of speaker of Afghanistan's parliament, after his supporters and critics had wrangled over the position for a month. | 02/27/11 20:28:26 By - Saeed Shah

Stryker soldier discharged, sentenced for assault on comrade

A Stryker soldier from Montesano was discharged from the Army and sentenced to 60 days of hard labor Wednesday after he was convicted of assaulting a comrade who blew the whistle on drug use in their platoon during a deployment to Afghanistan last year. | 02/24/11 12:05:08 By - Adam Ashton

Taliban bomber kills dozens at Afghan government office

A suicide attacker blew himself up at a government office Monday in northern Afghanistan, killing at least 32 and wounding 31 people, mostly those in line to get identity cards, local officials said. | 02/21/11 18:45:15 By - Hashim Shukoor

Taliban claims attack on Afghan bank that kills 9, injures 70

The attack was aimed at police officers who were collecting their salaries from a branch of Kabul Bank in Jalalabad, the biggest city in the eastern section of the country and capital of Nangahar province, which borders Pakistan. | 02/19/11 16:00:43 By - Hashim Shukoor

Tailor shops displace opium bazaar in Afghan town

Nothing better illustrates the transformation of this southern Afghan town than the central Koru Chareh market, where an entire street functioned as a drug bazaar when the Taliban were in control. Today tailors have set up business at one end, and legitimate enterprises have started filling the empty shops. | 02/18/11 17:49:24 By - Saeed Shah

Taliban marginalized in former stronghold, U.S. general says

The Taliban insurgents in the key Afghan province of Helmand have been driven out of the towns and marginalized, while U.S. forces are making "very steady progress" even in the most violent areas of the province, said the Marine Corps general who's in charge of the region. | 02/18/11 17:42:32 By - Saeed Shah

U.S. gave firm low rating for Afghan work — and more business

A U.S. contractor who's continued to receive government contracts despite criticism of its work in Afghanistan got low ratings for its performance on two more high-profile projects in the war-torn country than had been disclosed previously. McClatchy has learned that the U.S. government criticized Black & Veatch for poor oversight and delays on a Kabul power plant project and for a study of the viability of developing a natural gas field in the Sheberghan region in northern Afghanistan. | 02/14/11 09:30:00 By - Marisa Taylor

Suicide attack at Kabul shopping mall kills 2 guards

A suicide attacker blew himself up at the entrance of a shopping mall Monday in downtown Kabul, killing two guards and injuring two others, according to security officials. | 02/14/11 07:53:28 By - Hashim Shukoor

Military deploys acupuncture to treat soldiers' concussions

The U.S. military is applying an ancient Chinese healing technique to the top modern battlefield injury for American soldiers, with results that doctors here say are "off the charts." | 02/07/11 17:09:48 By - Saeed Shah

Bombing of supermarket ends peaceful period in Kabul

A bomb blast Friday at a Kabul supermarket that's popular with foreigners killed at least eight people, including three foreign nationals, police and witnesses said. The attack shattered a period of calm in the Afghan capital over the last few months. | 01/28/11 07:41:11 By - Hashim Shukoor and Saeed Shah

Karzai's pick for parliament speaker accused of atrocities

An Afghan warlord who's accused of gross human rights violations and was once close to Osama bin Laden has received the backing of President Hamid Karzai for the important post of speaker of the new parliament, which was inaugurated Wednesday. | 01/26/11 18:59:39 By - Saeed Shah

Watchdog faults Obama's Afghan security strategy

The Obama administration's $11.4 billion plan to bolster Afghanistan's security forces is "at risk" because of poor planning, a government watchdog agency concluded in a report released Wednesday. | 01/26/11 15:19:16 By - Marisa Taylor

Federal inquiry under way of no-bid contract in Afghanistan

The government watchdog of U.S. contracting in Afghanistan is scrutinizing a sole-source contract that was awarded to a firm even though it was widely criticized for its construction of a power plant project in Kabul. | 01/24/11 18:22:24 By - Marisa Taylor

Karzai yields on opening parliament, but still fights for court

Afghan President Hamid Karzai bowed Monday to domestic and international pressure to convene parliament, but he continued his battle with lawmakers over a special court he'd sought to investigate voting fraud allegations against members of parliament. | 01/24/11 15:51:22 By - Saeed Shah

U.N. envoy scrambles to save deal over Afghanistan's parliament

The United Nations representative in Afghanistan held an unscheduled meeting with Afghanistan lawmakers holed up at an upscale hotel here Sunday in an effort to rescue a deal that Western diplomats say is critical to instilling democracy in this war torn country. Legislators on Saturday thought they had a deal with Karzai that would allow the new parliament to begin work on Wednesday. | 01/23/11 17:01:33 By - Saeed Shah

Combat kills another female soldier in Afghanistan

Pfc. Renee Sinkler, 23, of Chadbourn, N.C., was the second woman soldier to die in combat since the 109th Transportation Co., known as the "Rough Riders" was deployed to Afghanistan in July. A gunner, she was in the exposed turret of an armored MRAP vehicle when it was struck by a rocket-propelled grenade, the Army said. | 01/22/11 17:06:40 By - Richard Mauer

Kabul showdown: Afghan lawmakers threaten to defy Karzai

President Hamid Karzai will meet with Afghan lawmakers Saturday in a last-ditch attempt to resolve their differences over a disputed election and avert a clash that could spiral into constitutional chaos. Many of those elected in last year's parliamentary elections have vowed to inaugurate the new parliament on Sunday in defiance of Karzai's order to delay the opening by another month. | 01/21/11 17:11:44 By - Saeed Shah

Karzai, Afghan parliament set for clash in constitutional crisis

President Hamid Karzai and Afghan lawmakers appear headed for a major clash after Karzai postponed the inauguration of the new parliament and politicians elected in the controversial vote said they'd start their work unilaterally. | 01/20/11 15:13:30 By - Saeed Shah

Key evidence in Stryker war crimes case remains secret

A few key documents and images remain under wraps as legal proceedings unfold for the soldiers in the 5th Brigade, 2nd Infantry Division accused of murdering three civilians last year for fun. Defense attorneys say the hidden files would help clear their clients. | 01/16/11 11:21:58 By - Adam Ashton

Citing traditional values, Afghans censor article on artist

Afghan government censors have ordered Kabul's largest English-language magazine to excise an article on an Afghan-American artist whose works they view as an offense to the nation's traditional values. | 01/15/11 10:51:24 By - Dion Nissenbaum

U.S. keeps funneling money to troubled Afghan projects

McClatchy found that U.S. government funding for at least 15 large-scale programs and projects grew from just over $1 billion to nearly $3 billion despite the government's questions about their effectiveness or cost. Welcome to Afghan aid, American-style. | 01/12/11 17:12:58 By - Marisa Taylor and Dion Nissenbaum

U.S. watchdog for Afghanistan contracting resigns

The embattled top watchdog of U.S. contracting in Afghanistan announced Monday that he's resigning days after vowing to resist congressional demands to step down. Four senators demanded the resignation in a letter to President Barack Obama late last year, saying Arnold Fields has done a poor job of scrutinizing how $56 billion in reconstruction money is being spent in Afghanistan. | 01/10/11 18:02:56 By - Marisa Taylor

Pakistan government holds together, but problems widen

Pakistan's shaky government was thrown a lifeline Friday when it regained its parliamentary majority by enticing back a political party that had previously quit the ruling coalition. Nonetheless, the deal, which was brokered around rescinding a recent increase in gasoline prices, further damages state finances for a nation already on the verge of bankruptcy. | 01/07/11 15:47:52 By - Saeed Shah

Stryker soldier's charges of murdering Afghan civilians should be dropped, investigator says

An investigating officer has recommended that the Army drop most of its case against one of the five Stryker soldiers accused of murdering civilians in southern Afghanistan last year. Spc. Michael Wagnon, 30, has maintained his innocence since he was confined at Joint Base Lewis-McChord amid accusations that he was part of a “kill team” in the 5th Brigade, 2nd Infantry Division that murdered civilians for sport. | 01/07/11 12:11:16 By - Adam Ashton

Military bans 2 U.S. firms from Afghan contracting

Nearly a year after two American construction companies abruptly shuttered their operations in Afghanistan and left the country allegedly owing their Afghan partners more than $2 million, the U.S. military announced Wednesday that it's temporarily blacklisting the firms. | 01/05/11 16:51:22 By - Dion Nissenbaum

Stryker soldier pleads guilty to misconduct in Afghanistan

A Joint Base Lewis-McChord soldier this morning pleaded guilty to five charges of misconduct, giving the Army its second conviction in its investigation into war crimes committed by Stryker soldiers on a recent deployment to Afghanistan. Spc. Emmitt Quintal is one of 12 soldiers from the 5th Brigade, 2nd Infantry Division accused of wrongdoing at Forward Operating Base Ramrod. Five are accused of murdering Afghan civilians and are awaiting trials at Lewis-McChord. | 01/05/11 14:59:44 By - Adam Ashton

Stung by Senate criticism, auditor of Afghan spending sacks aides

The top auditor of U.S. contracting in Afghanistan announced Tuesday that he had fired two of his deputies in a shake-up aimed at improving his investigations of waste and corruption. | 01/04/11 18:13:28 By - Marisa Taylor

Pakistan provincial governor assassinated by own guard

A senior Pakistani official was assassinated Tuesday in the middle of Islamabad by one of his own guards, apparently to protest the official's call for reform in the country's harsh laws against blasphemy. | 01/04/11 11:07:02 By - Saeed Shah and Jonathan S. Landay

U.S. Marines report peace deal with tribe in Afghan hot spot

The top U.S. Marine commander in southern Afghanistan said Monday that an influential Afghan tribe had agreed to put a stop to Taliban attacks in a highly contested part of Helmand province sometimes called "Afghanistan's Fallujah." | 01/03/11 17:53:20 By - Dion Nissenbaum and Hashim Shukoor

War crimes trial against Stryker soldiers has flaws

In hearings this fall, Army prosecutors, armed with sworn statements about plots to kill innocent civilians, have laid out their cases against soldiers accused of murder, conspiracy and other wrongdoing while serving in Afghanistan. But the hearings inside an aging brick building at Joint Base Lewis-McChord also have brought out some vulnerabilities in the government's case. | 12/29/10 11:18:36 By - Hal Bernton

Aid groups in Afghanistan question U.S. claim of Taliban setbacks

Citing evidence that Taliban insurgents have expanded their reach across Afghanistan, aid groups and security analysts in the country are challenging as misleading the Obama administration's recent claim that insurgents now control less territory than they did a year ago. | 12/28/10 18:03:30 By - Dion Nissenbaum

Charge that soldier killed Afghan civilians takes toll on his family

While his family plods through the holidays, Pfc. Andrew Holmes sits in a detention block on a Washington state Army base, one of five soldiers at Joint Base Lewis-McChord charged in the deaths of three civilians in Kandahar province this year. His parents, sisters, brother and new baby niece are waiting at home as complicated legal wrangling plays out to determine whether he’ll face a court martial. | 12/26/10 22:08:07 By - Kathleen Kreller

NATO challenged over Kabul raid that killed two guards

The NATO military team that targeted a Kabul office complex on Christmas Eve thought they were thwarting a holiday season plot to bomb the U.S. Embassy. But the pre-dawn raid that left two security guards dead found no explosives, no plot and no evidence. Instead, the operation brought the issue of night raids directly into the Afghan capital. | 12/26/10 17:27:08 By - Dion Nissenbaum and Hashim Shukoor

Suicide bomber in Pakistan kills at least 42 at food center

The attack in the town of Khar, the administrative center of the Bajaur tribal area, came amid ongoing fighting between Pakistan security forces and insurgents in the region bordering Afghanistan. A major clash in the neighboring Mohmand tribal area about 24 hours earlier had left 11 troops and about two dozen militants dead. | 12/25/10 21:30:28 By - Zulfiqar Ali and Laura King

Al Qaida-allied Afghan fighters seek new Pakistan haven

The Haqqani network, an extremist group close to Al Qaida that has mounted devastating attacks in Afghanistan, is attempting to move into a new safe haven in Pakistan's tribal region in hopes of escaping U.S. drone attacks and the possibility of a Pakistani military offensive. So far, local tribes have refused to let them. | 12/24/10 16:12:13 By - Saeed Shah

Air Force officials overturn Osprey crash findings

Senior Air Force generals overturned the findings of their own investigation team and ruled that the fatal crash of a CV-22 Osprey in Afghanistan in April was largely due to flight crew mistakes and not a mechanical problem. | 12/17/10 07:31:55 By - Bob Cox

Afghanistan progress report warns of continued al Qaida threat

President Barack Obama and his aides released a strategy assessment of the war in Afghanistan on Thursday that asserts U.S. troops are making gains but acknowledges serious threats to the effort and lays out a timeline that promises several more years of U.S. involvement. | 12/16/10 19:14:22 By - Nancy A. Youssef, Warren P. Strobel and Margaret Talev

Afghanistan report finds progress 'fragile,' offers few details

The long anticipated Obama administration assessment of its strategy in Afghanistan and Pakistan found that progress in the region so far is fragile and could easily unravel. A five-page unclassified summary of the full report released late Wednesday was noticeably lacking in detail, with no hard facts and no specifics on withdrawal of U.S. troops. | 12/16/10 06:01:00 By - Nancy A. Youssef

Army striking deals for testimony against Stryker squad leader

The Army's case against a Stryker squad leader who allegedly plotted to kill civilians in Afghanistan is shaping up with deals that require some of his former platoon mates to testify against him. | 12/12/10 10:42:25 By - Adam Ashton

Afghan official calls for election to be tossed out

Afghanistan's deputy attorney general on Saturday urged the country's highest court to throw out the contested results of recent legislative elections, a move that could hobble the new parliament and increase tensions between President Hamid Karzai and his international allies, who've warned him not to try to overturn the resuls of the elections. | 12/11/10 15:14:51 By - Dion Nissenbaum

Pakistanis protest civilian deaths in U.S. drone attacks

Victims of U.S. drone attacks in Pakistan took to the streets for the first time here Friday, as a new report claims that there are significant numbers of civilian casualties from the strikes and a lawsuit seeks hundreds of millions of dollars in damages from the CIA for those mistakenly injured or killed. | 12/10/10 17:19:41 By - Saeed Shah

Obama makes surprise visit to Afghanistan

President Barack Obama made a surprise visit to Afghanistan late Friday night amid renewed concerns about his administration’s plans to stabilize the country and bring American troops home. | 12/03/10 12:08:26 By - Dion Nissenbaum and Margaret Talev

Pakistanis: WikiLeaks proves leaders are U.S. puppets

A deluge of U.S. diplomatic cables has tarnished the reputation of Pakistan's political and military leadership with the country's public, adding to anti-American sentiments in Pakistan, analysts and politicians said Thursday. | 12/03/10 07:54:09 By - Saeed Shah

Court thwarts pardon of Pakistani facing death in blasphemy case

A surprise court intervention Monday in Pakistan could delay for years, or even scuttle, the chances of a presidential pardon for a Christian woman who's been condemned to death for blasphemy, lawyers and activists said. | 11/29/10 17:31:36 By - Saeed Shah

Afghan in border police uniform kills 6 U.S. soldiers

A man dressed in an Afghan Border Police uniform turned his weapon on American troops in eastern Afghanistan on Monday, killing six soldiers before being killed in a gun battle, NATO’s International Security Assistance Force said. | 11/29/10 09:33:37 By - Warren P. Strobel and Hashim Shukoor

Witness in Afghan civilian killings trial says slain man was Taliban scout

A member of a Joint Base Lewis-McChord infantry platoon voiced doubts in a military courtroom Tuesday that the shooting of an Afghan man could have been a premeditated murder staged to look like a combat death, as the Army alleges. | 11/24/10 07:42:23 By - Mike Archbold

Stryker Afghan war crimes probe now looking at officers' role

A brigadier general has been assigned to investigate whether officers should have known sooner about the alleged murders of Afghan civilians by members of the 5th Brigade, 2nd Infantry Division, and whether the officers create a climate where such crimes would occur. | 11/22/10 19:58:44 By - Adam Ashton

Army faces growing steroid use problem

Just weeks before his battalion of some 700 soldiers departed for Afghanistan in summer 2009, Lt. Col. Burton Shields had a disconcerting visit from an Army investigator. The agent said several soldiers under Shields' command at Joint Base Lewis-McChord had admitted to illegal use of steroids. One of the suspected users was a battalion captain. | 11/22/10 17:09:16 By - Hal Bernton

Unresolved Afghan election could undercut U.S. efforts

Ghazni province had half an election in September. Ethnic Pashtuns stayed home, thanks to intimidation by the Taliban insurgency. A rival group, the Hazara, went to the polls in droves, seeking political power as an antidote to their historical repression. | 11/22/10 16:32:40 By - Warren P. Strobel and Habib Zohori

Pakistani facing death in blasphemy case may be freed

Hopes were raised Monday that a Pakistani Christian woman, convicted of blaspheming the Prophet Muhammad this month and sentenced to death, will be pardoned soon, after government officials said they expected her to be freed. | 11/22/10 15:38:00 By - Saeed Shah

Whistleblower details bribes, fraud in Afghanistan

A corporate whistleblower whose evidence of fraud led to one of the largest fines ever against a war-zone contractor said that he was ordered to facilitate bribes, keep information from government auditors and inflate overhead rates. Former Louis Berger Group employee Harold Salomon outlined what he saw of the contractor's business practices in his first interview since the case was settled earlier this month. | 11/21/10 22:27:01 By - Warren P. Strobel

U.S. could be in Afghanistan beyond 2015, NATO official says

A top NATO official said Wednesday that a complete handover of security to Afghan forces by 2014 was "realistic, but not guaranteed," and the transition could last into 2015 "or beyond." | 11/17/10 18:39:58 By - Warren P. Strobel

In 'safe' Afghan province, few want NATO forces to depart

Poverty is endemic in Bamiyan and the infrastructure barely past medieval, but this peaceful province is about as good as it gets in Afghanistan today. | 11/17/10 17:53:27 By - Warren P. Strobel

Karachi, Pakistan's biggest city, on edge of gang-led civil war

At Karachi's giant Shershah automobile parts market, customers are scarce nowadays, fearing more violence of the sort that left 13 dead last month. The gunmen arrived by motorbike and rampaged through the narrow alleys of the bazaar, executing shopkeepers. | 11/17/10 16:41:22 By - Saeed Shah

NATO: Afghan turnover could last into 2015 'or beyond'

A top NATO official said Wednesday that a complete handover of security to Afghan forces by 2014 was "realistic, but not guaranteed," and the transition could last into 2015 "or beyond." | 11/17/10 14:17:28 By - Warren P. Strobel

Under new plan, U.S. troops will stay in Afghanistan till 2014

The White House on Tuesday unveiled a plan for Afghanistan that foresees U.S. troops remaining there until at least the end of 2014, more than three years past when President Barack Obama promised he'd begin withdrawing troops from the war-torn country. | 11/16/10 19:44:18 By - Nancy A. Youssef

U.S. hires firms with questionable pasts for Afghan jobs

McClatchy found nearly $4.5 billion in contracts that were awarded to companies even though they violated laws or had high-profile disputes over previous projects. Such legal or financial troubles could indicate that a company isn't prepared to finish a project or is prone to wasting taxpayer money. | 11/14/10 00:01:00 By - Marisa Taylor

Factory, coal mine show connections matter most in Afghan business

The Ghori Cement Factory and the nearby Karkar Coal Mine have become symbols of the corruption, nepotism and mismanagement that pervade President Hamid Karzai's government, hobble the U.S. effort to rebuild Afghanistan, and fuel the Taliban-led insurgency that now threatens both sites. | 11/14/10 00:01:00 By - Jonathan S. Landay

Contractor leaves Afghan police stations half-complete

The failure of a construction company to finish six police stations in northern Afghanistan has created a swath of political and economic wreckage, undermining a central pillar of President Barack Obama's plans for extracting America from a decade of war. | 11/14/10 00:01:00 By - Dion Nissenbaum and Hashim Shukoor

Flawed projects prove costly for Afghanistan, U.S.

The U.S. is spending billions of dollars to build facilities for Afghanistan's expanding national police and new garrisons for its army. The ambitious program is a linchpin of President Barack Obama's strategy to strengthen Afghan security forces so 100,000 U.S. troops can come home. However, like much of the wider Afghan reconstruction effort, it's faltering. | 11/14/10 00:01:00 By - Dion Nissenbaum, Warren P. Strobel, Marisa Taylor and Jonathan S. Landay

McCain, Lieberman urge Obama to drop 2011 Afghan date

A delegation of four U.S. senators, asserting that the U.S. counterinsurgency is making headway in Afghanistan, heightened pressure Wednesday on President Barack Obama to abandon his pledge that the United States would begin withdrawing troops in July 2011, a deadline that seems increasingly wobbly. | 11/10/10 17:21:19 By - Warren P. Strobel

Obama officials moving away from 2011 Afghan date

The Obama administration has decided to begin publicly walking away from what it once touted as key deadlines in the war in Afghanistan in an effort to de-emphasize President Barack Obama's pledge that he'd begin withdrawing U.S. forces in July 2011, administration and military officials have told McClatchy. | 11/09/10 18:49:32 By - Nancy A. Youssef

Obama: Pakistan's terror fight 'not as quick as we'd like'

President Barack Obama on Sunday defended the U.S. alliance with India's bitter rival Pakistan, but acknowledged that Pakistan's slow progress in rooting out terrorists "is not as quick as we'd like." But he implored Indians to trust Pakistan. | 11/07/10 20:44:11 By - Margaret Talev

Bragging about killing Afghan civilians was met with disbelief

Staff Sgt. Calvin Gibbs' big talk about killing Afghan civilians and getting away with it made him stand out when he joined a new platoon at an Army base in southern Afghanistan a year ago, according to written statements from his comrades. Some thought he had to be kidding. On Tuesday, Gibbs will appeared in a military court in Washington state where the evidence against him will be detailed. | 11/07/10 20:42:45 By - Adam Ashton

Obama tells India Pakistan making slow progress on terror

President Barack Obama on Sunday touched on the sensitive topic of Pakistan during a question-and-answer session with Indian students, defending the U.S. alliance with India's bitter rival and saying Pakistan is making slow progress in rooting out terrorists. | 11/07/10 07:15:20 By - Margaret Talev

Afghan soldier turns weapon on American troops, kills 2

A soldier from the U.S.-trained Afghan army apparently turned his weapon on American troops in volatile southern Afghanistan, killing at least two U.S. soldiers, NATO officials said Saturday. The incident is the latest that calls into question the allegiances of at least some members of the Afghan security forces. | 11/06/10 17:40:55 By - Warren P. Strobel and Habib Zohori

Candidates protest Afghanistan's September elections

A group of parliamentary candidates from across Afghanistan, saying they’d been wrongfully disqualified, on Saturday demanded a re-run of September’s elections and promised new rallies to protest electoral fraud. The move by a dozen candidates drawn from provinces in northern and central Afghanistan appears unlikely to change the outcome of the deeply flawed Sept. 18 election, whose final results have yet to be announced. | 11/06/10 09:57:54 By - Warren P. Strobel and Habib Zohori

$69.3 million Afghan-contracting fine may be a record

A nearly $70 million fine announced Friday against one of the U.S. government's largest Afghanistan contractors is an apparent record war-zone settlement, and it grew from a classic David vs. Goliath confrontation. | 11/05/10 17:21:09 By - Warren P. Strobel and Marisa Taylor

Contractor Louis Berger settles in Afghan overbilling probe

One of the government’s highest profile American contractors in Afghanistan has agreed to pay tens of millions of dollars to settle allegations that it overbilled the U.S. government. In return, the Justice Department will end its investigation into allegations that Louis Berger was intentionally over charging American taxpayers, individuals close to the investigation told McClatchy Thursday. | 11/04/10 15:04:32 By - Warren P. Strobel and Marisa Taylor

Soldier accused of leading Afghan civilian killings to top hearings schedule

Two of the 12 soldiers awaiting hearings at Joint Base Lewis-McChord for crimes they are accused of committing in Afghanistan had their court dates postponed last week. Seven others have had their hearings delayed in recent weeks. One result of the postponements is that most of the soldiers are now scheduled to appear in court for their Article 32 hearings after Staff Sgt. Calvin Gibbs, who allegedly devised schemes to kill Afghan civilians. | 11/01/10 07:43:00 By - Adam Ashton

Iraqis gather plant samples to replace destroyed collection

On this mountainside in Iraqi Kurdistan, botanists are gathering hundreds of plant samples in an effort to protect their country's diverse environment, ranging from northern mountain ranges to the marshes of southern Iraq. | 10/28/10 15:52:08 By - Jane Arraf

U.S.-employed Afghan security firms often benefit Taliban insurgents

In a wood-paneled office here in the dusty fringes of Kabul, Hajji Shirin Dil feverishly works the phones. He could be a Wall Street day trader, if not for the sleepy gunmen by his side. Instead, Dil owns a profitable logistics company and is cutting deals with various warlords, whose private security companies protect his trucks carrying vital provisions to the foreign troops. | 10/28/10 15:27:46 By - Anand Gopal

U.S. can't untangle billions in Bush-era Afghan spending

The U.S. government knows it's awarded nearly $18 billion in contracts for rebuilding Afghanistan over the last three years, but it can't account for spending before 2007. The special inspector general for Afghanistan reconstruction found it too difficult to untangle how billions have been spent because of the U.S. agencies' poor recordkeeping | 10/27/10 18:28:27 By - Marisa Taylor

U.S. officials, experts: No high-level Afghan peace talks under way

Despite news reports of high-level talks between the Taliban and the Afghan government, no significant peace negotiations are under way in Afghanistan, U.S. officials and Afghanistan experts said Thursday. These same experts said the reports, which appeared in a number of U.S. media outlets, could be part of a U.S. "information strategy" to divide and weaken the Taliban leadership. | 10/22/10 11:09:57 By - Jonathan S. Landay and Warren P. Strobel

U.S. soldier held in probe of Taliban detainee's death

The U.S. military detained an American soldier and launched a criminal investigation Tuesday after Afghan President Hamid Karzai publicly accused U.S. forces of shooting and killing a Taliban leader in his southern Afghanistan jail cell. | 10/19/10 19:16:21 By - Dion Nissenbaum

Family of soldier accused of killing Afghan civilians is skeptical of charges

Soldiers who fought in Iraq alongside Spc. Michael Wagnon don’t recognize their friend when they read reports of his alleged role in a plot to kill civilians while deployed in Afghanistan this year with a Joint Base Lewis-McChord Stryker brigade. | 10/18/10 07:45:43 By - Adam Ashton

Soldier accused in Afghan killings will face court martial

Spc. Jeremy Morlock, the first accused Afghanistan civilian killer to face charges in a military courtroom so far, will go to a full court-martial at Joint Base Lewis-McChord near Tacoma and could face life in prison without possibility of parole. | 10/15/10 19:01:51 By - Matt Misterek

Risky Pakistan route imperils Afghanistan bound U.S. supplies

The proportion of supplies for American troops in Afghanistan passing through Pakistan has dropped by half in the past two years, as attacks and bureaucratic delays have forced Pakistani transport companies and individual truck drivers to reconsider the job. | 10/15/10 16:52:11 By - Saeed Shah

Senators question reconstruction oversight in Afghanistan

For the third time in less than two years, a bipartisan group of senators has raised alarms about oversight of the reconstruction effort in Afghanistan and why President Barack Obama has been slow to do something about it. | 10/15/10 15:09:47 By - David Goldstein

U.S. forces may have killed aid worker accidentally

U.S. Army Gen. David Petraeus, the commander of the international military coalition in Afghanistan, launched an investigation into the failed weekend rescue attempt of British aid worker Linda Norgrove after British Prime Minister David Cameron said she may have been killed by the U.S. special forces who staged the raid. | 10/11/10 08:50:09 By - Dion Nissenbaum

British aid worker held in Afghanistan killed in rescue attempt

A U.S.-led military rescue operation ended in failure Friday when a Taliban militant set off explosives that killed a British aid worker kidnapped two weeks ago in eastern Afghanistan. | 10/09/10 16:08:08 By - Dion Nissenbaum

Pakistan orders probe of video showing civilian executions

The Pakistani military on Friday ordered an investigation into a video that appears to show soldiers executing six civilians, following the recording’s exposure in the international media and U.S. pressure. The gruesome video was posted on the internet last month. | 10/08/10 07:08:06 By - Saeed Shah

Have floods pushed Pakistan to get its act together? Not yet

The U.S. and other foreign donors are voicing alarm that Pakistan's civilian government, having failed to organize rescue and relief during the floods that devastated a fifth of the country this past summer, still hasn't produced a reconstruction plan for the 20 million people affected. | 10/07/10 18:10:02 By - Saeed Shah

Pakistan blocks NATO convoys, but Taliban get free passage

For more than a week since a confused U.S. helicopter strike killed two Pakistan paramilitary soldiers, Pakistan has blocked scores of Western supply convoys on the vital route that supports the U.S-led military campaign in Afghanistan. | 10/07/10 16:45:03 By - Dion Nissenbaum

Officer: Army has evidence to try soldier in Afghans' deaths

An Army investigating officer this week recommended that a Stryker soldier accused of killing three civilians in Afghanistan should go to trial to face the charges. Col. Thomas Molloy found that that Spc. Jeremy Morlock's statements provided enough evidence to put him on trial for participating in the killings. A decision is expected within a few weeks. | 10/06/10 21:35:36 By - Adam Ashton

U.S. apologizes to Pakistan for troop deaths in airstrike

The U.S. apologized Wednesday for the deaths of two Pakistani paramilitary troops and the wounding of four others in a cross-border airstrike by U.S. helicopters that prompted Islamabad to close two vital supply routes used by the U.S.-led force in Afghanistan. | 10/06/10 18:43:26 By - Jonathan S. Landay

Soldier who blew whistle on Afghan killings moved for his safety

Spc. Adam Winfield, 21, became a whistle-blower in the case when he told Army investigators that he alerted his father about the crimes being committed by his Stryker brigade squad early this year and also shared with him that he feared for his own life. He's been moved to solitary confinement for his own protection. | 10/05/10 19:52:54 By - Matt Misterek

Afghan wrestles with protecting NATO supply routes

With a government-imposed deadline looming to shutter Afghanistan's private security companies, Afghanistan officials are pushing for the creation of a new state-run military brigade equipped with its own trucks and thousands of soldiers to ferry essential NATO supplies around the country. Protecting routes has emerged as a central issue in recent days because of attacks along the network of roads from Karachi, Pakistan, through the fabled Khyber Pass and into Afghanistan. | 10/03/10 19:59:38 By - Dion Nissenbaum

Afghan war crimes case reopens scrutiny of Iraq killings

Staff. Sgt. Calvin Gibbs, a central figure in the Afghanistan war-crimes case against Western Washington-based soldiers, talked about killing a family while he served in Iraq, according to a sworn statement from a fellow soldier obtained by The Seattle Times. | 09/30/10 21:02:26 By - Hal Bernton

Pakistan cuts key route to Afghanistan over deadly U.S. raid

Pakistan brought a critical NATO supply route for U.S.-led forces in Afghanistan to an abrupt halt on Thursday after NATO aircraft crossed into Pakistan in a confused attack that killed three Pakistani paramilitary troops. Hundreds of trucks bound for the Torkham crossing, the main crossing point between Pakistan and Afghanistan, were halted as NATO said it was investigating the incident. | 09/30/10 11:42:05 By - Dion Nissenbaum

Karzai near tears as he launches Afghan peace commission

Choking back tears and showing signs of stress, Afghan President Hamid Karzai made an emotional appeal for unity Tuesday before unveiling a peacemaking commission that includes longtime Taliban rivals, former warlords and suspected drug barons. | 09/28/10 17:47:51 By - Dion Nissenbaum and Jonathan S. Landay

Stryker soldier accused of murdering Afghans has hearing

A Stryker brigade soldier accused of murdering Afghan civilians made regular use of narcotics during his deployment and was fearful of his squad leader who persuaded others to participate in schemes to kill people in combat-like situations, his attorney argued in a pre-trial hearing Monday. | 09/28/10 13:00:04 By - Adam Ashton

Prosecutors: Soldier was 'eager participant' in Afghan killings

A Stryker brigade soldier accused of murdering Afghan civilians made regular use of narcotics during his deployment and was fearful of his squad leader who persuaded others to participate in schemes to kill people in combat-like situations, his attorney argued in a pre-trial hearing Monday. Army prosecutors countered that the soldier was a "right-hand man" and an "eager participant." | 09/28/10 07:54:24 By - Adam Ashton

U.S. defends Pakistan incursion as 'self-defense'

Pakistan protested angrily Monday after the U.S.-led international force in Afghanistan confirmed that its helicopters staged cross-border air strikes last week against Pakistan-based Afghan militants "in self defense." | 09/27/10 18:25:31 By - Jonathan S. Landay and Saeed Shah

Videos raise new voter fraud questions in Afghanistan

As Afghan election officials sorted through thousands of voter complaints from the recent parliamentary election, new evidence emerged Monday of apparent vote rigging in southern Afghanistan. | 09/27/10 18:20:21 By - Dion Nissenbaum

Alaska soldier's drug use an issue in war crimes hearing

Spc. Jeremy Morlock on Monday will become the first soldier from Joint Base Lewis-McChord to face a hearing on allegations he and other soldiers killed civilians in Afghanistan in what could be a high-profile prosecution of U.S. war crimes in the Afghan war. Murlock's attorney will argue that his statements should be discounted, because he was taking at least 10 prescription drugs. | 09/26/10 19:03:18 By - Hal Bernton

First hearing for Stryker soldiers in Afghan slayings Monday

The charges stacked up against five soldiers from Joint Base Lewis-McChord sound as if they rank among the worst war crimes in the past nine years of combat in the Middle East: killing Afghan civilians and keeping gruesome souvenirs from the attacks. | 09/26/10 09:40:36 By - Adam Ashton

Afghan election panel reports new evidence of serious fraud

Internal reports Tuesday from Afghanistan’s Independent Election Commission provided new evidence of serious fraud in Afghanistan's parliamentary elections, including turnouts that exceeded 100 percent in many southeastern districts under the control of the Taliban or other militants. | 09/21/10 17:11:59 By - Jonathan S. Landay and Dion Nissenbaum

Firm gets new federal contract despite overbilling probe

Ignoring calls to scrutinize troubled contractors, the U.S. military has awarded a portion of a $490 million contract to an American corporation that's under investigation for possible fraud. | 09/20/10 18:47:51 By - Marisa Taylor

Fraud, violence tarnished Afghan vote, watchdog says

Afghanistan's leading election watchdog group accused the nation's warlords, powerbrokers and Taliban insurgents on Monday of tarnishing the closely watched parliamentary elections by stuffing ballots, attacking polling places and using fake voter cards. | 09/20/10 11:10:37 By - Dion Nissenbaum

Afghan election watchdog amasses evidence of fraud

Afghanistan's leading election watchdog expressed deepening alarm Sunday at reports it was amassing of vote-rigging and bloodshed that claimed at least two dozen lives in the nation's second legislative election since the 2001 U.S. invasion. | 09/19/10 17:44:12 By - Jonathan S. Landay and Saeed Shah

Government has let Blackwater, KBR off the hook, too

The Obama administration's dilemma in deciding how to punish contractors for contract violations and other infractions isn't confined to the Louis Berger Group or to Afghanistan. The administration decided last month not to bring criminal charges against the security contractor formerly known as Blackwater, now named Xe Services, after a nearly four-year investigation found sanctions violations, illegal exports and bribery, as McClatchy first reported in June. | 09/19/10 00:01:00 By - Marisa Taylor and Warren P. Strobel

U.S. contractor accused of fraud still winning big Afghan projects

On July 31, 2006, an employee of the Louis Berger Group, a contractor handling some of the most important U.S. rebuilding projects in Afghanistan, handed federal investigators explosive evidence that the company was intentionally and systematically overbilling American taxpayers. | 09/19/10 00:01:00 By - Marisa Taylor and Warren P. Strobel

Low turnout, Taliban intimidation plague Afghan elections

Deep-seated voter discontent, calculated attempts to rig the vote and widespread Taliban intimidation Saturday marred Afghanistan's parliamentary election, which was considered a bellwether for America's troubled campaign to stabilize the war-weary nation. | 09/18/10 15:30:49 By - Jonathan S. Landay, Saeed Shah and Dion Nissenbaum

Mother, daughter defy violence to run in Afghan elections

When Hawa Alam Nuristani ran for a seat in the Afghan parliament five years ago, gunmen ambushed her on a campaign visit to remote mountain villages and she survived a five-hour rescue on donkeys and her supporters' shoulders with blood oozing from a leg wound. Now she's not only seeking re-election from Nuristan province in parliamentary elections Saturday, but her daughter has followed her mother into the cutthroat arena of Afghan politics. | 09/17/10 19:16:54 By - Jonathan S. Landay

Election campaigning in Kandahar? Don't leave the house

The specter of violence hangs over Saturday's parliamentary election in Afghanistan — and no place moreso than in Kandahar, Afghanistan's second largest city. There, candidates don't hold rallies. They don't even leave their homes or hotel rooms. In the face of Taliban assassinations, it's just too dangerous for them to venture out. | 09/16/10 20:13:17 By - Saeed Shah

Another kind of Afghan mission: Organizing a roping contest

Of all of Arnold Norman's missions as an agricultural adviser at a remote outpost in Afghanistan, organizing a roping competition would not have appeared anywhere. But Norman, 59, an avid team roper on weekends in Texas, discovered dozens of young American soldiers, and a few Afghans, who found swinging a rope at a dummy steer to be an unexpected salve for the stresses of combat and loneliness. | 09/15/10 21:09:44 By - Chris Vaughn

U.S.-led forces meet little initial resistance in Kandahar operation

U.S.-led forces began a key operation Wednesday in the nine-year-old war in Afghanistan, meeting surprisingly little initial resistance in the district in the south of the country that gave birth to the Taliban. | 09/15/10 18:49:38 By - Saeed Shah

U.S. begins long-awaited assault on Taliban stronghold

Three battalions of the 101st Airborne, bolstered by Army rangers and special forces, stormed into the Zhari district west of Kandahar city before dawn on Wednesday in an area U.S. troops call "the heart of darkness." Zhari has been at the forefront of Afghanistan's wars for the last 30 years, an area that Soviet invaders never pacified in the 1980s and that gave rise to Mullah Omar, the Taliban leader who controlled Afghanistan when al Qaida launched the 9/11 terrorist attacks. | 09/15/10 02:23:29 By - Saeed Shah

Warlords and killers seek re-election to Afghan parliament

Hundreds of minority Hazara civilians were killed in Afshar in February 1993 in one of the bloodiest chapters of the battle for Kabul, between rival U.S.-armed guerrilla factions that had ousted the Soviet-backed regime the previous year. The man who directed the onslaught, according to residents and human rights groups, was Abdul Rab Rasoul Sayyaf, an Islamist member of parliament's lower house who's close to U.S.-backed President Hamid Karzai. He's running for re-election from Kabul, and analysts say he could be the next speaker of the lower house. | 09/14/10 16:46:31 By - Jonathan S. Landay

45-year-old U.S. infantryman does heavy lifting in Afghanistan

Jeffery Williamson was so angered by the 9/11 attacks that he decided to join the military, only to be told that at 36, he was a year too old to enlist. Five years later, on the day the Army raised the age limit to 42, he joined at 41. He's served in Iraq, and now he's back on the front lines, this time in Afghanistan. | 09/13/10 16:02:18 By - Saeed Shah

Patron of Afghan school is local warlord, U.S. ally

There's only one functioning school in all of Zhari district in insurgency-plagued southern Afghanistan, and it's named for an anti-Taliban local strongman who uses his own private militia to protect it. | 09/10/10 16:50:30 By - Saeed Shah

Afghan police often find themselves in combat

The Obama administration's plans to begin withdrawing some U.S. troops from Afghanistan in July, as well as allied NATO countries' eagerness to get their forces out, depend on handing over security to the Afghan army and police. However, the Afghan National Police, not the army, are often in the frontlines of the military campaign. | 09/09/10 19:43:57 By - Saeed Shah

In Afghanistan, vital information is sometimes lost in translation

American soldiers in Afghanistan are relying on civilian interpreters who in some cases don't know the languages they were hired to speak, resulting in dangerous military mistakes. | 09/09/10 19:08:29 By - Ben Arnoldy, The Christian Science Monitor

Stryker brigade soldiers allegedly kept 'trophy' body parts

New details in Army charge sheets paint a disturbing picture of depravity of 12 Stryker soldiers from Joint Base Lewis-McChord during their recent deployment to Afghanistan. Six of the men kept trophy body parts from Afghan corpses, including a skull and fingers, the charge sheets say. | 09/09/10 13:11:41 By - Mike Archbold

More Stryker Brigade soldiers charged with assault on Afghans

Five soldiers from a Western Washington-based infantry brigade have been charged with aggravated assault for firing on three Afghan men, expanding the scope of the alleged crimes committed by a troubled group in Afghanistan's Kandahar province. | 09/03/10 18:09:26 By - Hal Bernton

Taliban tries to stop the music in Afghanistan — again

Farouq Pacha's shop was one in a string of music stores to become a new target for militants many suspect are Taliban enforcers looking for new ways to re-impose their conservative views — even in once-stable havens such as Jalalabad. | 09/03/10 17:30:09 By - Hashim Shukoor

Officials: Afghan corruption undermines anti-Taliban campaign

As the last of the 30,000 additional troops that President Barack Obama dispatched to Afghanistan arrived, top American military leaders here conceded Friday that the country's pervasive corruption threatens to undermine the effort to clear communities of insurgents and hand them over to governments that Afghans consider legitimate. | 09/03/10 17:29:29 By - Nancy A. Youssef

From one Afghan setback, U.S. strategy finds success

Chris Harich was catching up on e-mails at his cramped southern Afghanistan office in mid-June when a colleague popped his head in to deliver the news: The Arghandab district governor, America's main political point man in the volatile valley, had just been assassinated. | 09/02/10 18:54:45 By - Dion Nissenbaum

Washington Democrat sees progress during Afghan trip

Since he last visited Afghanistan, Rep. Rick Larsen said, the lights are on in Kabul 24/7, the U.S. Chamber of Commerce has opened a chapter in the Afghan capital, and the market there is so jammed with traffic that he and the three other congressmen he was with couldn't get in. | 09/02/10 18:54:27 By - Les Blumenthal

U.S. vehicles destroy Afghan bombs by rolling over them

Spc. Joshua Joe drives a "Husky," a giant vehicle built to find and withstand the blast of a roadside bomb, putting him in the front line of the U.S.-led coalition's battle against the Taliban's most effective weapon in Afghanistan. | 09/02/10 18:52:26 By - Saeed Shah

Karzai, NATO at odds over another Afghan airstrike

Afghan President Hamid Karzai and NATO disagreed Thursday over whether an airstrike in northern Afghanistan killed the top member of re-emerging insurgent group or 10 election workers. | 09/02/10 18:27:17 By - Nancy A. Youssef

U.S. toll rising in Afghanistan: 22 soldiers killed since Friday

U.S. forces lost 22 soldiers in Afghanistan, mostly to roadside bombs, since Friday, marking a bloody step-up in the insurgency as a major U.S.-led offensive seeks to capture the spiritual homeland of the Taliban movement in Kandahar. | 09/01/10 08:10:53 By - Saeed Shah

Lawmaker: July 2011 too soon to start leaving Afghanistan

Just back from a nine-day trip to the world's trouble spots, Rep. Brian Baird, D-Wash., said Tuesday that despite progress, plans to start reducing U.S. troop levels in Afghanistan next summer are probably unrealistic. | 08/31/10 15:58:46 By - Les Blumenthal

U.S. soldiers face murder charges in deaths of Afghan civilians

In one of the most serious war crimes cases to emerge from the nine-year war in Afghanistan, five U.S. soldiers from a Stryker brigade in the Army’s 2nd Infantry Division have been charged with murder for allegedly killing three Afghan civilians. | 08/25/10 10:59:11 By - Hal Bernton

Afghanistan's new war crimes museum punts on still-powerful warlords

He was a very tall man who wore outsized shoes and blue clothes. Sayed Husain taught history and prayed at the mosque, and for that he was thrown into jail in 1979. Educated people like him were the first to be rounded up when the Communists came to power in 1978, kicking off Afghanistan's three decades of turmoil. | 08/24/10 16:22:04 By - Ben Arnoldy, Christian Science Monitor

Pakistan president claims criticism is sign of his popularity

In an interview with a small group of foreign reporters, President Asif Ali Zardari warned that Taliban extremists and "rightist forces" could take advantage of the country's floods crisis. At least one prominent political figure in exile over the weekend all but called for a military coup. | 08/23/10 15:06:51 By - Saeed Shah

Family, U.S. offer differing versions of deadly Afghan raid

When Ismail Nemeti set out from Kabul last week to join his family in nearby Wardak province for the start of the Islamic holy month of Ramadan, friends said, his biggest fear was running into Taliban forces who might question his allegiances. Before sunrise the next day, Aman lay bleeding in his family guest room, alongside two of his brothers, all shot dead by U.S. special forces who were on the hunt for a Taliban leader. | 08/20/10 15:02:37 By - Dion Nissenbaum and Hashim Shukoor

Under pressure, Karzai agrees to back anti-graft efforts

Under pressure from Washington, Afghan President Hamid Karzai publicly agreed Friday to back the independence of two American-backed anti-corruption groups that the Afghan president had threatened to rein in amid an ongoing investigation that's targeted one of his trusted palace aides. | 08/20/10 15:01:27 By - Dion Nissenbaum

Winning in Afghanistan may hinge on power of persuasion

The American Army had arrived. Taliban fighters had been pushed on the defensive with surprising ease. With U.S. attack helicopters zipping by overhead, Babur elders gathered alongside swaths of red grapes drying in the southern Afghanistan dirt to hear from the new village rulers. | 08/19/10 19:03:31 By - Dion Nissenbaum

Top Senate Democrat Kerry presses Karzai on corruption

U.S. Sen. John Kerry arrived in Kabul on Tuesday for another tough diplomatic mission to smooth over newly strained relations between Afghan President Hamid Karzai and the Obama administration. | 08/17/10 13:33:00 By - Dion Nissenbaum

Meeting with Karzai opponents highlights U.S. policy dispute

Four members of the House of Representatives held talks last month in Europe with leaders of Afghanistan's ethnic minorities opposed to President Hamid Karzai and his U.S.-backed initiative to open political negotiations with the Taliban. | 08/16/10 19:03:45 By - Jonathan S. Landay and Warren P. Strobel

Fired Afghan commander McChrystal will teach at Yale in fall

Retired Army Gen. Stanley McChrystal will be a senior fellow at Yale's Jackson Institute for Global Affairs for the fall semester and will teach a graduate level course that will examine how globalization has increased the complexity of modern leadership. | 08/16/10 18:46:06 By - David Owens

Karzai to ban private security companies in Afghanistan

The abrupt announcement Monday that all private companies providing security services must close by the end of the year places a new burden on NATO and U.S. forces, which employ the companies to provide security along key transport routes. | 08/16/10 15:35:20 By - Dion Nissenbaum and Hashim Shukoor

Pakistan flood crisis raises fears of country's collapse

The humanitarian and economic disaster caused by the worst floods in Pakistan's history could spark political unrest that could destabilize the government, dealing a major blow to the Obama administration's efforts to fight violent Islamic extremism. The government's shambling response could force President Asif Ali Zardari from office. | 08/13/10 19:06:38 By - Saeed Shah and Jonathan S. Landay

U.S. soldiers' mission shows Afghan war's uncertainties

After months of deadly and often demoralizing fighting alongside mediocre Afghan forces in one of the Taliban's most intractable strongholds outside Kandahar city, the Americans in one Army company are asking themselves if it had been worth it. Amid growing U.S. concerns about the war, no one is feeling the pressure to demonstrate progress more than the Americans working on the rustic, isolated bases in southern Afghanistan. | 08/13/10 17:22:14 By - Dion Nissenbaum

U.N. appeals for Pakistan aid as flood threat continues

The United Nations appealed Wednesday for $459 million in emergency aid for Pakistan as fresh monsoon rains raised fears that new flooding could drive more people from their homes, deepening the humanitarian catastrophe. It's affected some 14 million people, of whom an estimated 1,600 have been killed and about 2 million left homeless. | 08/11/10 17:54:44 By - Saeed Shah

In small rubber boat, Pakistani navy searches for flood victims

The craft was part of an operation to rescue people around Sukkur, the city in Sindh province where the wall of water unleashed by the worst flooding in Pakistan's history was cresting Tuesday as it moved south down the Indus River toward the Arabian Sea. | 08/10/10 18:42:51 By - Saeed Shah

U.N.: Taliban attacks drive up Afghan civilian casualties

Civilian casualties in Afghanistan surged by 31 percent during the first six months of this year over the same period in 2009, driven by increased bombings and assassinations by the Taliban-led insurgency, the United Nations reported Tuesday. | 08/10/10 16:38:20 By - Hashim Shukoor

When troops' belongings stolen, North Carolina comes to the rescue

Army Maj. Jeff Leopold packed photos of family, uniforms, and his faithful iPod, dropping everything into a Milvan headed for Afghanistan. The Milvan was shipped three months ago, so it would be waiting for the troops. Yet two weeks ago, when they went to get their stuff at Bagram Air Base, the box had been cleaned out. Everything had been stolen. | 08/09/10 12:50:38 By - David Perlmutt

U.S. dentist slain in Afghanistan wouldn't proselytize, brother says

The twin brother of one of the 10 medical volunteers killed in Afghanistan last week spoke out Sunday about the nature of his brother's work, saying there was no element of Christian proselytizing. | 08/09/10 06:41:12 By - Lisa Demer

Ten medical aid workers robbed, killed in Afghanistan

Ten members of an international medical mission, including six Americans, were robbed and killed while returning from a two-week trek through risky parts of eastern Afghanistan, Afghan officials and organizers of the aid mission said Saturday. | 08/07/10 13:23:32 By - By Dion Nissenbaum and Hashim Shukoor

Pakistani floods threaten lives, crops and government

The wall of floodwater that's rushing through Pakistan devastated new areas Thursday, reaching the most heavily populated parts of the country, officials and aid workers said. | 08/05/10 17:08:22 By - Saeed Shah

Ex-Guantanamo detainee now campaigning in Afghanistan

In a country whose young parliament is filled with warlords, suspected drug barons, one-time mujahedeen fighters and religious zealots, Izatullah Nasrat Yar can still make history. Yar has set out to become the first "enemy combatant" once held at the U.S. detention center at Guantanamo Bay to become an elected Afghan lawmaker. | 08/04/10 19:00:38 By - Dion Nissenbaum

Petraeus renews limits on airstrikes in Afghanistan

Afghanistan commander Army Gen. David Petraeus has renewed orders to American troops to refrain from calling in artillery or air power when battling Taliban forces unless they're certain that no civilians are present. | 08/04/10 18:57:12 By - Nancy A. Youssef

U.S. PR offensive highlights insurgent attacks on Afghan civilians

In one of his first major initiatives since he took command of the international force in Afghanistan a month ago, Army Gen. David Petraeus has launched a public relations offensive to focus attention on the Taliban-led insurgency's killings and abuse of Afghan civilians. | 08/04/10 17:54:02 By - Jonathan S. Landay and Dion Nissenbaum

U.N.-listed 'terror front' group leads flood relief in Pakistan

A militant Islamist group linked to the 2008 terrorist assault on Mumbai, India, is openly distributing aid to victims of the floods in northwest Pakistan, according to members of the group. | 08/03/10 19:21:51 By - Saeed Shah

As Pakistani government falters after flooding, Islamists fill void

Amid wide complaints about an inadequate government response, private charities, including some linked to Islamic extremists, are stepping in to help victims of the worst flooding in Pakistan in decades, which has claimed some 1,500 lives. | 08/02/10 18:37:27 By - Saeed Shah

Critical U.S. battle begins in Afghanistan amid many doubts

As the U.S.-led coalition launches its most critical military operation of the nine-year war in Afghanistan, doubts are growing about whether the United States and its allies can contain the surging Taliban-led insurgency and prevent the country from reverting to an al Qaida sanctuary or erupting in civil war. | 07/30/10 21:10:52 By - Dion Nissenbaum and Jonathan S. Landay

Body of second missing sailor found in Afghanistan

The body of the second of two U.S. sailors who went missing after driving into an ambush has been found outside of Kabul, Pentagon officials said Thursday, but the circumstances that led the men to drive alone into one of Afghanistan's most dangerous regions remained unclear. | 07/29/10 19:01:51 By - Nancy A. Youssef and Hashim Shukoor

Search continues for missing sailor in Afghanistan

The body of a sailor who was killed in a Taliban ambush arrived home in the United States Tuesday as the military continued a massive search for his comrade, whom the Taliban claimed it kidnapped last week in eastern Afghanistan. | 07/27/10 20:44:46 By - Nancy A. Youssef

Pentagon identifies sailor missing in Afghanistan

The Defense Department on Tuesday identified a missing U.S. serviceman in Afghanistan as Petty Officer 3rd Class Jarod Newlove, a West Seattle sailor who is the target of a massive search by Afghan and international forces. A second sailor, Petty Officer 2nd Class Justin McNeley, was killed. His body has been recovered. | 07/27/10 18:29:55 By - Hal Bernton and Steve Miletich

Officials: WikiLeaks release could hurt Afghan war effort

The publication of some 92,000 classified U.S. military reports on the Afghanistan war could complicate the Obama administration's strategy for ending the Taliban-led insurgency by hurting cooperation with Pakistan and throttling the flow of vital ground intelligence, current and former U.S. officials said Monday. | 07/26/10 19:54:57 By - Jonathan S. Landay, Saeed Shah and Nancy A. Youssef

New checkpoints are key to coming Afghan military operation

When the U.S. and Afghan militaries launch their long-awaited Kandahar operation as early as this weekend, the key to its success may lie in some obscure mountain roads that connect the dusty heartland of the Taliban insurgency with a fertile valley nearby. | 07/23/10 18:57:55 By - Dion Nissenbaum

Pakistan extends powerful army chief's term for 3 years

The Pakistani government on Thursday gave the country's top military official, army chief Gen. Ashfaq Parvez Kayani, another three years in his post, a move that analysts said would bolster Pakistan's anti-terrorism fight and cement its role in neighboring Afghanistan. | 07/22/10 18:51:37 By - Saeed Shah

Afghan president agrees to U.S. withdrawal plan

Joined by leaders from Iran to America, President Hamid Karzai embraced plans Tuesday for Afghan forces to begin taking control of their country by next summer as another bleak assessment of the war raised new questions about the timing of the hand-over. | 07/20/10 19:28:19 By - Dion Nissenbaum and Hashim Shukoor

As Afghanistan's future unfolds, concerns turn to women's health

Just hours after Secretary of State Hillary Clinton reiterated her commitment to protecting Afghan women's rights at an international conference in Kabul, members of women's advocacy groups met Tuesday on Capitol Hill to discuss progress and issues concerning Afghan women's health. | 07/20/10 19:24:16 By - Reid Davenport

Clinton unveils $500 million in aid projects for Pakistan

Secretary of State Hillary Clinton on Monday unveiled $500 million worth of civilian aid projects for key ally Pakistan, in an attempt to counter rampant anti-Americanism in the country by reaching out to the population with tangible help. | 07/19/10 18:24:27 By - Saeed Shah

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SPECIAL REPORT: AFGHAN CONTRACTS

unfinished police station

The U.S. is spending billions of dollars to build facilities for Afghanistan's expanding national police and new garrisons for its army. The program, like much of the wider Afghan reconstruction effort, is faltering.

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