Stories from South Asia
Supporters of a prominent university professor, and one of Afghanistan’s most vocal critics of the Taliban, are calling for his release after he was arrested on Saturday. Faizullah Jalal, a professor at Kabul University, was detained by the Taliban after the group […]
In the brightly lit lobby of an Albanian hotel hosting Afghan refugees, a group of women gather to discuss how to counter the repressive rules introduced by the Taliban. The group includes Afghan lawyers and prosecutors who are among about […]
Every night, after putting his 2-year-old son to bed, Muhajir sits down in the corner of his family’s small room in a refugee centre in Albania and starts writing in a notebook. For months he has been documenting his family’s […]
On the afternoon of August 15, the day Kabul fell to the Taliban, Ahmad Javid, a 37-year-old soldier in the Afghan security forces, was preparing to head north to test a new weapon system that his unit had finished training on the day […]
It was a chilly Friday afternoon when an extended roar of more than two dozen motorbikes pierced the silence in the Spin Boldak district of Kandahar province. To an outsider, the sudden invasion earlier this month by a large group of men on […]
Taliban Prime Minister Mohammed Hassan Akhund has been criticised by Afghans and the international community over comments he made on the country’s worsening famine crisis. In his first speech since the extremist group took control of Afghanistan in August, Mr Akhund addressed the nation […]
When Afghanistan fell to the Taliban in August, Mohammad Yasin had to make some difficult decisions very quickly. As the country reeled from the shock of the insurgent takeover, the 21-year-old—whose name has been changed to protect his safety—snuck into […]
Afghan television personalities say the Taliban’s new rules controlling women on screen will exclude half of the population from popular culture. The Taliban’s reinstated Ministry for the Promotion of Virtue and Prevention of Vice issued eight guidelines on Sunday, including a […]
IN MARCH OF LAST YEAR, Rabia and her two young daughters were forced to leave their home in northern Afghanistan. While facing the threat of increased violence, their village was also in the midst of a severe drought that strained the […]
At 32 years old, Dr. K is old enough to remember the first time the Taliban took control of Afghanistan in 1995. She was 7 when girls were banned from school. “For years, my mother ensured that we continued our […]