Search

KABUL, Afghanistan -- Four aid workers, including two women, who were abducted May 22 were freed early Saturday in a NATO rescue operation in northern Afghanistan, according to a NATO spokesman and a Swiss-based aid organization, Medair. Captured by insurgents while returning from a visit to a nutrition and hygiene project in the remote mountainous region of Badakhshan Province, the group included two Afghans who worked with the aid organization. The area is so remote that it can be reached only on horseback, and the four were riding back when they were abducted. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

KABUL, Afghanistan -- There are few certainties for Afghanistan as the NATO troop withdrawal moves into high gear, but one of them is this: the Continental Europeans have a grimmer prognosis for what can be accomplished than do their American and British counterparts. As they assess Afghanistan, the Europeans see an economic depression looming as Western aid and military spending evaporate; corruption, already endemic, is escalating dangerously as Afghan power brokers milk the war economy for every last penny before it dries up; security remains elusive -- not only because of the Taliban, but also because ethnically based militias are reactivating across large parts of the country. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

KABUL, Afghanistan -- The moment that President Obama chose to visit Afghanistan for the first time in 17 months was a rare chance for him to make the most of a brief window when relations between the two governments are improving after months of crisis, and when the likely fallout of the coming NATO withdrawal is still months away. In the background, however, lurk a host of concerns about how things could go once the bulk of American troops leave and the pipeline of foreign aid slows to a trickle, which is expected to happen by the end of 2014. Both will increase the country's already deep sense of precariousness. And there is concern, too, about whether what once were cornerstone American goals in Afghanistan -- establishing reliable security forces, hobbling the insurgency, curbing endemic corruption, securing enduring rights for women and minorities -- are now unrealistic given the looming deadline. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

CORRECTION APPENDED KABUL, Afghanistan -- Two American officers were shot dead inside the Interior Ministry building here on Saturday, and NATO responded by immediately pulling all its advisers out of Afghan ministries in Kabul, in a deepening of the crisis over the American military's burning of Korans at a NATO military base. The order by the NATO commander, Gen. John R. Allen, came on the fifth day of virulent anti-American demonstrations across the country, and it was a clear sign of concern that the fury had reached deeply into even the Afghan security forces and ministries working most closely with the coalition. [ABSTRACT FROM PUBLISHER]

KABUL, Afghanistan -- Afghan government officials who traveled to the snowbound village where seven children and a young adult reportedly were killed in a NATO airstrike this week said that the bombing was based on incorrect information. The officials said that after talking to local residents and seeing the area, they concluded that an informer had misled the French troops who control the area. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

KABUL, Afghanistan -- A record number of Afghan civilians were killed in the conflict here last year, the majority at the hands of the Taliban and other insurgent groups whose use of homemade bombs became more prevalent and whose suicide bombers killed more people each time, according to the annual United Nations report on civilian casualties. Although the number killed -- 3,021 civilians -- represented a relatively small 8 percent increase in casualties over 2010, it was the fifth straight year in which civilian casualties rose. The overall trend suggested that the fighting was worsening and that, for all the talk about peace efforts and a drastic increase in the number of insurgents that NATO had killed and captured, day-to-day dangers for Afghan civilians were rising. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

KABUL, Afghanistan -- Some American-trained, Afghan local police officers have engaged in illegal taxation, carried weapons outside their villages and in some cases committed assault, but over all the NATO military leadership thinks they have been ''effective,'' according to a report issued late Thursday. The report, written by Brig. Gen. James R. Marrs of the United States Air Force, is a response to a highly critical study by Human Rights Watch released in September that detailed allegations of human rights abuses by the relatively new Afghan local police force and by irregular armed groups across the country. Of the 46 accusations of human rights abuses in the Human Rights Watch report, General Marrs found 7 credible and 15 partly credible. He determined that 10 allegations were not credible and that 14 could not be researched sufficiently to permit a conclusion. [ABSTRACT FROM PUBLISHER]

KABUL, Afghanistan -- For the second time in three days, a night raid in eastern Afghanistan by NATO forces resulted in the death of a child, setting off protests on Saturday that turned violent and ended in the death of a second boy. A NATO spokesman apologized for the child's death, which took place early Saturday in western Nangahar Province in the Hesarek District, a remote poppy-growing area close to Kabul Province and Logar Province. There has been almost no NATO presence there throughout the war, and the area is thought to be heavily penetrated by the Taliban. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

KABUL, Afghanistan -- A cousin of Afghanistan's president was killed Wednesday during a night raid by NATO and Afghan forces in which they detained the man's son as a suspected Taliban commander, as well as at least two of the family's bodyguards. The case brought the delicate issue of civilian casualties into the presidential palace and added to the already tense relationship between the Afghans and the Americans. It also raised questions about whether a member of the extended family of President Hamid Karzai might have Taliban ties, or whether bad intelligence led to a deadly raid on the home of an innocent family. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

KABUL, Afghanistan -- The heroes in the suicide bombing at the Kabul City Center shopping mall on Monday were not among the police officers or NATO coalition and American Special Forces soldiers who showed up later. They were Gul Agha and Lal Mohammed, two poorly paid security guards who had what has lately been one of the worst jobs in Afghanistan -- screening visitors at the door. [ABSTRACT FROM PUBLISHER]

KABUL, Afghanistan -- The White House report on Afghan strategy released Thursday was notable as much for what it did not say as for what it did. It reports some real military gains, but acknowledges that they remain fragile and that NATO troops will need more time to achieve their goals. However, that progress has come only by adding more troops in key areas, and the fierce debate to come will be over whether any troops can be subtracted without undermining that progress. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

CORRECTION APPENDED WASHINGTON -- President Obama swept into a dark and windy Afghanistan on Friday for a surprise holiday season visit with troops as the nine-year American-led war heads into a new phase intended to finally begin transferring control of the country to Afghan forces. Wrapped in a tight cocoon of secrecy and security, Mr. Obama landed at Bagram Air Base, north of Kabul, on a pitch-black evening and told thousands of American service members who greeted him that they had begun to turn the tide in a war that has frustrated commanders and soldiers alike for nearly a decade. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

KABUL, Afghanistan -- A Taliban court had already scheduled the sentencing of a young Afghan aid worker named Attiqullah, when NATO forces raided the Taliban prison where he was being held in mid-August. ''Friday your trial will start, and it will be up to the judge what happens to you,'' Attiqullah, 22, recalled being told by his jailers, who were registering his name on a list of detainees to be tried. ''It is up to him if they sentence you to death or cut part of your body.'' [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

KABUL, Afghanistan -- A Taliban leader in northern Afghanistan believed to have been involved in the kidnapping of a New York Times reporter as well as the intimidation of the local population was captured on Tuesday in Takhar Province. The Taliban commander, whom Maj. Sunset R. Belinsky, a NATO spokeswoman, declined to name, was known as a district leader in Chahar Darah, in Kunduz Province, which borders Takhar. The area has become increasingly unstable in the last several months with frequent reports of Taliban activities there. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

KABUL, Afghanistan -- In the wake of charges from Afghan officials that civilians were killed in two attacks over the weekend, the American military apologized for one episode in which a child was killed and two other children wounded and said it was investigating the deaths of several civilians in the other episode. On Sunday in Logar Province, insurgents fired on a police checkpoint and a nearby American base. The Americans returned fire and later discovered that they had killed two civilians, according to a NATO spokesman and local Afghan officials. Din Mohammed Darwish, the spokesman for the Logar provincial governor, said one of the dead was an 8-year-old girl. Two boys, ages 6 and 9, were wounded, he said. The American military issued a statement apologizing for the deaths. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

KABUL, Afghanistan -- The NATO military command in Afghanistan has quietly issued new guidelines on contracting aimed at pushing commanders to take a tougher approach to how they spend billions of dollars. It is part of an effort to reduce corruption and decrease the funds that indirectly flow to the insurgency. The American-led military operation here now spends about $14 billion a year on contracting work, according to military officials. [ABSTRACT FROM PUBLISHER]

KABUL, Afghanistan -- The body of a missing American sailor who was captured in Logar Province was found Sunday, according to a statement released Tuesday from a NATO spokesman. The dead sailor was one of two Americans captured by the Taliban on Friday, and a large-scale search was undertaken to find them. The search for the other sailor is continuing, a NATO spokesman said. [ABSTRACT FROM PUBLISHER]

KABUL, Afghanistan -- A seemingly routine training practice in marksmanship went fatally wrong on Tuesday when an Afghan Army sergeant turned his weapon on an American trainer and a gunfight began. When it was over, the sergeant, two American trainers and an Afghan soldier who had been standing nearby lay dead. The fight, which also wounded a NATO soldier, occurred near the northern city of Mazar-i-Sharif at a training center for Afghan soldiers named Camp Shaheen, according to a statement from the NATO command and an Afghan defense official. [ABSTRACT FROM PUBLISHER]

KABUL, Afghanistan -- After intensive negotiations with NATO military commanders, the Afghan government on Wednesday approved a program to establish local defense forces that American military officials hope will help remote areas of the country thwart attacks by Taliban insurgents. Details of the plan are sketchy, but Americans had been promoting the force as a crucial stopgap to combat rising violence here and frustration with the slow pace of training permanent professional security forces -- the bottom-line condition for the American military to begin pulling back from an increasingly unpopular war. Many parts of Afghanistan have no soldiers or police officers on the ground. [ABSTRACT FROM PUBLISHER]

KABUL, Afghanistan -- With American commanders pushing to expand the number of armed village forces in areas where their troops and the local police are scarce, the Afghan president is signaling that he has serious concerns that such a program could return the country to warlordism, challenging the power of the central government. The village forces have been one of the top subjects under discussion in frenetic daily meetings for the past week between Gen. David H. Petraeus, the American military commander in Afghanistan, and Hamid Karzai, the Afghan president. The two are scheduled to meet again on Tuesday, according to senior NATO military officials here. [ABSTRACT FROM PUBLISHER]

KABUL, Afghanistan -- In a successful effort to win back a remote district from the Taliban, NATO helicopters dropped more than 200 Afghan commandos and a smaller number of American Special Operations troops into northeastern Afghanistan, NATO officers and Afghan officials close to the operation said Tuesday. A recent influx of insurgents, primarily Pakistani Taliban fighters, into the Barg-e-Matal District of Nuristan Province led to battles with Afghan forces during the past week and had raised fears that the insurgents were trying to establish a haven there after being forced out of Pakistan by Pakistani military operations. [ABSTRACT FROM PUBLISHER]

KABUL, Afghanistan -- In an effort to win back a remote district taken by the Taliban, NATO helicopters dropped more than 200 Afghan commandos and a smaller number of American special forces troops into northeastern Nuristan Province overnight Monday, NATO officers close to the operation said Tuesday. A recent influx of insurgents, primarily Pakistani Taliban, into the district led to battles with Afghan forces during the past week and had raised fears that the insurgents were trying to establish a safe haven there after being forced out of Pakistan by the Pakistani Army. [ABSTRACT FROM PUBLISHER]

KABUL, Afghanistan -- Western leaders are banking on a national peace council set to begin here on Wednesday to start a new chapter in Afghanistan's political life, bringing the country together and strengthening President Hamid Karzai, even as security deteriorated on Sunday in several areas of the country. In a joint news conference, the NATO commander, Gen. Stanley A. McChrystal, and the senior civilian representative, Mark Sedwill, emphasized that the West supported the peace council, called a jirga, even as many Afghans questioned whether those attending would truly represent the many factions in the country. [ABSTRACT FROM PUBLISHER]

KABUL, Afghanistan -- A Pentagon report on the last six months in Afghanistan portrays an Afghan government with limited credibility among its people, a still active if not growing insurgency and an enormous reliance on American troops to train, outfit and finance the country's defense forces for the foreseeable future. The report, released on Wednesday, is mandated by Congress every six months. It points to some improvements, including an increased optimism among Afghans about their government and the slowing of the insurgency in places where NATO troops have concentrated their efforts. [ABSTRACT FROM PUBLISHER]

KABUL, Afghanistan -- Twelve trucks, most of them carrying fuel to a NATO base in eastern Afghanistan, were burned by an angry crowd early Sunday less than 30 miles from Kabul, according to local officials and NATO reports. The attack was thought to be in retribution for two raids by a joint Afghan-American force over the weekend, Afghan officials said. It was the first significant attack on a convoy in Logar Province, south of Kabul, in the past 18 months, said the provincial governor's spokesman, Din Mohammed Darwish. [ABSTRACT FROM PUBLISHER]

KABUL, Afghanistan -- As President Hamid Karzai made more antagonistic statements over the weekend toward the NATO countries fighting on behalf of his government, the West was taking stock of just how little maneuvering room it has. There are no good options on the horizon, many analysts say, for reining in Mr. Karzai or for penalizing him, without potentially damaging Western interests. The reluctant conclusion of diplomats and Afghan analysts is that for now, they are stuck with him. [ABSTRACT FROM PUBLISHER]

KABUL, Afghanistan -- A delegation from one of the most important insurgent groups fighting Afghan and NATO forces met for the first time with President Hamid Karzai on Monday for preliminary discussions on a possible peace plan with the government. Spokesmen for Gulbuddin Hekmatyar, the leader of the insurgent group, the Islamic Party, and Mr. Karzai confirmed the meeting, saying the delegation was also meeting with others in the government and leaders of other political movements. [ABSTRACT FROM PUBLISHER]

An imam at a mosque on the eastern outskirts of Kabul tucked his 7-year-old son into the back seat of his car and set out for work a little before 8 on Thursday morning, for a journey he made about the same time almost every day. But this time, he was shot to death when he crossed paths with a NATO convoy about a mile from an American base that has repeatedly been struck by suicide bombers. [ABSTRACT FROM PUBLISHER]

The secretary general of NATO sought Tuesday to address fears that international forces would leave Afghanistan too soon, saying that the 43 nations in Afghanistan would stand by the country until it was ready to stand on its own. In his remarks at a joint news conference with the Afghan president, Hamid Karzai, Anders Fogh Rasmussen, the NATO secretary general, tried to reassure those who feared that a premature withdrawal would leave the Afghan people and government vulnerable to Taliban insurgents. [ABSTRACT FROM PUBLISHER]

Taliban militants fired rockets on a bazaar northeast of Kabul on Monday, near the site of a meeting between French soldiers and local tribal leaders, and police officials said 10 Afghan civilians were killed and 28 wounded. NATO troops reported that 4 civilians had been killed and 40 wounded. No troops were reported wounded or killed in the attack. Soldiers helped to ferry the wounded to local hospitals and to a nearby NATO base for medical care, a spokesman said. [ABSTRACT FROM PUBLISHER]

KABUL, Afghanistan -- A normally peaceful northern city erupted in violence on Wednesday, as thousands of protesters clashed with security forces after a NATO night raid that local officials claim killed four civilians. NATO defended the night operation and said the four people who were killed, two of them women, were armed insurgents who fired on its troops. At least a dozen people were killed Wednesday as protesters armed with Kalashnikov rifles, axes, grenades and gasoline bombs battled with the police on the streets of Taliqan, the capital of Takhar Province, in the northeast, and then assaulted a small NATO base on the city's outskirts, local officials and witnesses said. [ABSTRACT FROM PUBLISHER]

BRUSSELS -- The United States is helping senior Taliban leaders attend initial peace talks with the Afghan government in Kabul because military officials and diplomats want to take advantage of any possibility of political reconciliation, Obama administration and NATO officials said Thursday. Even as senior American officials cautioned that they were not yet ready to formally join a nascent peace effort with their Taliban foes of the past nine years, they acknowledged that the reconciliation effort was an important element in the American-led war in Afghanistan. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]