KABUL Eleven Taliban suicide bombers attacked government buildings in eastern Afghanistan on Tuesday, sparking running gunbattles that killed at least 20 people and wounded three U.S. troops, officials said. U.S. and Afghan troops freed 20 hostages taken by the insurgents. The assault began around 10 a.m. when a suicide bomber …

KABUL – Video of the aftermath of a disputed incident involving American forces and the Taliban shows bloodied bodies of children laid out with other corpses, confirming international Red Cross findings at the two remote villages in western Afghanistan. The U.S. military does not contest that civilians died but called …

KABUL – Sobbing relatives showed U.S. and Afghan investigators the demolished buildings and graves in two western villages where a local official said Thursday he collected the names of 147 people killed in a disputed incident involving American forces and Taliban militants. If local reports of the death toll are …

KABUL – Afghan officials said U.S.-ordered bombing runs killed dozens of civilians taking shelter Tuesday from a battle with Taliban militants, and villagers took several truckloads of bodies to show the provincial governor. The U.S. promised a joint investigation. A provincial councilman said he saw about 30 bodies, many of …

Afghanistan’s insurgency can be brought to an end through “soft diplomacy” with the Taliban, if Western forces commit to a timetable to withdraw from the country, a veteran of past negotiations with the militants says. Sayed Jalal, a former child prodigy famous across the country for brokering talks between Iran …

Afghanistan President Hamid Karzai on Sunday said U.S. efforts to tame the growing Taliban insurgency through negotiations would fail unless his government agreed to such talks. The Obama administration has announced it will send more troops and economic assistance to Afghanistan as well as intensify diplomacy within the region in …

Kabul – The United Nations office in Afghanistan Monday condemned the assassination of a woman provincial legislator in southern Afghanistan by Taliban militants. Sitara Achikzai, who was aged in her 50s, was shot dead Sunday afternoon by Taliban fighters riding on motorbikes outside her home in Kandahar city, the capital …

HERAT, Afghanistan – Taliban militants publicly executed a man and girl on Monday for eloping when she was already engaged to marry someone else, an official said, in a sign of the grip the Islamists have over parts of Afghanistan. Hashim Noorzai, head of Khash Rud district in southwestern Nimruz …

KANDAHAR, Afghanistan  – Taliban gunmen on motorbikes gunned down a woman provincial legislator in Afghanistan Sunday as authorities said they had killed 40 more Taliban in their battle to defeat the extremists. Legislator Sitara Achikzai, a high school teacher and women’s rights activist in her 50s, was shot dead outside …

KANDAHAR, Afghanistan – A female provincial official known for fighting for women’s rights was gunned down in southern Afghanistan on Sunday, following a day of fighting in the region that left 22 militants dead, officials said. A Taliban spokesman, Qari Yousef Ahmedi, claimed responsibility for the attack.