Successive wars for control over Afghanistan, beginning with the Great Game of the 19th century and continuing with the Soviet invasion and the U.S.-led war against the Taliban, have left behind a landscape that is both stark and striking. Rostyslav Khotin of RFE/RL's Ukrainian Service recently traveled to Afghanistan to see what clues the Kremlin's 1979-89 occupation might hold for Ukraine's own conflict with Russia.
Afghanistan: Life In A Historical Battlefield
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The Afghan capital Kabul viewed from a neighboring hilltop.
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The tomb of Afghan King Nadir Shah, who was assassinated in 1933. The renovated shrine stands on Maranjan Hill overlooking eastern Kabul. A NATO surveillance airship can be seen just overhead.
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An Afghan boy herding a flock of sheep.
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Public portraits of former mujahedin fighters remain a common fixture in Kabul. Here, Mohammad Fahid, Burhanuddin Rabbani, and Ahmad Shah Masud.
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Women wearing all-encompassing burqas are seen mainly in Afghan villages and poor city outskirts.
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Toilet paper, alcohol-free beer and Pop Tarts -- some of the products up for sale at Kabul's Bush Bazaar, formerly known as the Brezhnev Bazaar during the Soviet occupation.
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A typical Afghan village, where houses are built on hilltops from stone, clay, or concrete.
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Some of Afghanistan's earliest European explorers described Kabul as "paradise" because of the sound of birds singing in local gardens. Here, an Afghan man selling finches at a market.
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A U.S. military vehicle outside Bagram Air Base.
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Afghanistan remains littered with the hulls of Soviet tanks destroyed by mujahedin fighters during the 1979-89 occupation.
