Stories from South Asia
On the morning of Sept. 12, just hours ahead of a historic meeting between the Afghan government and the Taliban, a short note, written in Dari, was posted on the insurgent group’s website. It attempted to explain why, even after months of […]
National identity cards in Afghanistan will carry a person’s mother’s name alongside that of the father following the latest decree signed into law by Afghan President Ashraf Ghani. The move comes after years of campaigning by Afghan women seeking greater […]
A historic meeting between the Afghan government and the Taliban insurgency to negotiate the end of two decades of war in the country began on Saturday. After months of delays, the Afghan delegation, led by Dr Abdullah Abdullah, chairman of […]
The much delayed intra-Afghan talks are set to begin on Saturday, the Afghan government and Taliban confirmed. US President Donald Trump revealed on Thursday that Secretary of State Mike Pompeo had left for Doha, Qatar, for the talks. Mr Trump […]
“Mohammed Gul” insists he was never a member of the Afghan Taliban, even though he was one of 5,000 inmates released by the government as a condition to bring the insurgents to the negotiating table. But if the peace talks […]
Since he was a child, 60-year-old Nidan Singh Sachdeva has never missed a single Saavan mela, an annual religious gathering celebrated by the Sikh community in Afghanistan’s Paktya province to mark the monsoon season. The dry mountainous terrains of Afghanistan […]