A powerful explosion has ripped through a mosque in the Afghan capital of Kabul,killing at least 50 people.
So often the West’s failure in Afghanistan gets discussed in abstract terms;these women’s stories reveal precisely what is at stake.
A bombing at a mosque and religious school in Afghanistan has killed at least 33 people,including students of a religious school.
A former elite soldier has told the Federal Court he felt threatened into co-operating with three newspapers being sued for defamation by war veteran Ben Roberts-Smith.
Afghanistan produces about 5.5 tonnes of opium,which the UN Office on Drugs and Crime says could potentially yield 290 tonnes of pure heroin.
“I would like to be a doctor in the future but for now I have no hope,I am like a dead body,” Khadija,16,said in reaction to the news.
“All schools are going to open to all boys and girls,” Aziz Ahmad Rayan,a spokesman for the Taliban-run Ministry of Education,said.
The former soldier said he doubted whether the war veteran should have been awarded the Victoria Cross as the only witnesses were members of Mr Roberts-Smith’s own team.
As hundreds of thousands of Afghans try to flee persecution from the Taliban or starvation from the country’s economic collapse,business has boomed for the people smugglers.
Rescuing Arifa Hakimi from Afghanistan was a three-month mission in which she narrowly avoided a deadly bombing,disguised herself and faced a dangerous border crossing.
Human rights activists say the women were forced to make the declarations.