AFGHANISTAN: Harsh Winter Claims Lives In Makeshift Camps

Freezing cold weather has worsened the plight of thousands of Afghans living in makeshift camps since their return from refugee camps in neighbouring Pakistan and Iran.

AFGHANISTAN: Broad Support Found for Govt, Foreign Troops

If U.S. President George W. Bush is looking for good news, he should be talking less about Iraq and more about Afghanistan, according to the latest survey results from that country.

AFGHANISTAN: Female MP Comes out Firing

Women's activist turned politician Malali Joya on Tuesday picked up where she left off two years ago, condemning Afghanistan's warlords, some of who now sit with her in the Parliament that convened Monday after three decades.

RIGHTS: Group Exposes CIA’s “Dark Prison” in Afghanistan

Amid efforts by a bipartisan coalition in Congress to ban torture and inhumane treatment of detainees in the "war on terror", a major U.S. human rights groups charged Monday that Washington ran a secret prison in Afghanistan where suspected terrorists were held in total darkness for days and even weeks at a time from 2002 until at least last year.

AFGHANISTAN: Women’s Rights Await New Parliament

As a new parliament opens in the Afghan capital, Monday, all eyes are on Malalai Joya, a 27-year-old woman, who has emerged as a fearless critic of the warlords that control the country.

DEVELOPMENT: Frustration Builds in Iraq, Afghanistan

Despite increased funding to reconstruct the war-ravaged nations of Iraq and Afghanistan, a lack of security and severely damaged infrastructure are crippling rebuilding efforts in the two countries, two former diplomats said at a discussion in New York Tuesday.

AFGHANISTAN: The Next Quagmire?

Canada and its allies in the North Atlantic Treaty Organisation (NATO) could soon find themselves smack dab in the middle of a Colombian-style drug war in Afghanistan, warns a prominent drug control expert.

RIGHTS-US: Report on Covert Prisons Abroad Spurs UN, EU Probes

Pressure mounted on the George W. Bush administration Thursday to provide details of secret prisons abroad reportedly run by the Central Intelligence Agency (CIA), where terror suspects are held incommunicado in dark, sometimes underground cells.

AFGHANISTAN: Four Years After US Campaign, Perils Abound

On the eve of the fourth anniversary of the launch of U.S. military operations against the Taliban regime, Afghanistan presents a mixed picture, according to experts here.

AFGHANISTAN: Was Women’s Vote a Roar, or a Whisper?

While the administration of U.S. President George W. Bush describes the recent elections in Afghanistan as a major step forward for the war-torn nation, human rights groups here wonder if women will have an effective voice in the new parliament.

AFGHANISTAN: Election Day Passes, Peacefully

Afghanistan's landmark national assembly and provincial elections passed off in relative peace on Sunday, though marred somewhat by charges of coercion by partisan officials and by stray violence.

AFGHANISTAN: Elections May Be Less Than Free

While Afghanistan's parliamentary elections Sunday are expected to go relatively smoothly, the freedom with which they are being carried out is being questioned by many observers.

POLITICS: Pakistan Hit by Islamist Backlash

Spiralling conflict between the Pakistan army and Islamist militants along the Afghan border, straddled by pro- Taliban, Pashtoon tribes, has led security analysts to talk of a full- fledged insurgency that poses a graver threat to the country than admitted by authorities.

RIGHTS-AFGHANISTAN: Calls Mount to Prosecute Past Atrocities

As an unexpected resurgence of fighting by Taliban and allied forces against the U.S.-backed government of Pres. Hamid Karzai is raising new concerns over Afghanistan's stability, Human Rights Watch (HRW) has repeated its call for the prosecution of past atrocities by key warlords, a number of whom continue to hold senior posts under Karzai.

AFGHANISTAN: Kabul, Washington Press Pakistan on Taliban

Even as the war between U.S.-led forces and the Taliban intensifies in Afghanistan, a first rate diplomatic row has erupted between Pakistan and - who?

RIGHTS: UN Experts Cite Credible Reports of Torture at Guantanamo

Four U.N. human rights experts said Thursday that they will investigate all aspects of detention at the U.S. naval base at Guantánamo Bay in Cuba, where some 500 prisoners are being held without charges, despite the U.S. government's failure to respond to repeated requests to allow a visit there.

AFGHANISTAN: Women Candidates Face Own Attacks

As deadly attacks on military targets in Afghanistan rise prior to scheduled fall elections, women candidates are facing their own entrenched non-lethal barriers, says one contender.

AFGHANISTAN: UN Group Wants NATO Support Against Opium Poppy

The United Nations Office on Drugs and Crime is calling for NATO support to provide the security needed for cutting down on poppy cultivation in Afghanistan.

POLITICS-U.S.: Military Finds Itself in Twilight Zone

On the day that U.S. citizens honoured the nation's war dead, the U.S. armed forces found themselves in a twilight zone somewhere between glory and hell.

RIGHTS: U.S. Torture Report Assailed

Civil rights groups are accusing the U.S. government of failing to admit the extent to which abuse of non-citizens in U.S. custody in Afghanistan, Iraq, and its base at Guantanamo Bay, Cuba, violates the international treaty against torture.

RIGHTS-ASIA: Amnesty Reports Rampant Violence Against Women

Mao Hengfeng was sent to a labour camp for 18 months in April last year for persistently petitioning the Chinese authorities over a forced abortion 15 years earlier, when she became pregnant in violation of China's family planning policy.