BERLIN, Feb. 1 — Germany on Friday rejected a formal request from the United States to send forces to war zones in southern Afghanistan, the latest setback to the NATO alliance as it tries to scrape together enough troops to battle resurgent Taliban forces and stabilize the country.

ISLAMABAD, Pakistan – A missile from a U.S. Predator drone struck a suspected terrorist safehouse in Pakistan and killed a top al-Qaida commander believed responsible for attacks on U.S. forces and the brazen bombing during a visit last year by Vice President Dick Cheney to Afghanistan, a U.S. official said …

KABUL, Afghanistan – Two deadly bombings in Afghanistan yesterday underscored the difficulties in combating the tactics of the Taliban insurgency, a campaign now increasingly using suicide bombers moving through cities in search of vulnerable targets. more stories like this * 3 civilians killed in Afghan bombings * British soldier killed …

ASADABAD, Afghanistan (AFP) — Taliban militants beheaded Wednesday four Afghan roadworkers abducted a week ago while a series of rebel bombings killed three civilians, authorities said.

BRUSSELS, Belgium (AP) — NATO on Wednesday urged Canada not to pull its troops from Afghanistan’s dangerous Kandahar region and pledged to help find the 1,000 additional allied troops Ottawa is demanding.

WASHINGTON (AP) — Afghanistan risks sliding into a failed state and becoming the “forgotten war” because of deteriorating international support and a growing violent insurgency, according to an independent study.

OTTAWA (AFP) — Canada’s military in Afghanistan has been taking fewer prisoners and releasing them quicker after it stopped turning them over to Afghan authorities following torture allegations, The Globe and Mail said.

By Alexandre Deslongchamps Jan. 28 (Bloomberg) — Prime Minister Stephen Harper said Canada should place conditions on a decision to extend its military mission in Afghanistan beyond 2009, as a government- commissioned panel recommended last week.

WASHINGTON, Jan 26: The US-installed Afghan President Hamid Karzai has said that he knew people called him “a puppet of America” and he was willing to accept this image because without US help Afghanistan would have been occupied by its neighbours and Al Qaeda.

KANDAHAR, Afghanistan, — An American woman and her Afghan driver were kidnapped by gunmen in this southern town Saturday morning on her way to work, the provincial governor said.