RFE/RL's Radio Azadi is one of the most popular and trusted media outlets in Afghanistan. Nearly half of the country's adult audience accesses Azadi's reporting on a weekly basis.
RFE/RL spoke to shopkeeper Charin Singh, who is believed to be the only Sikh remaining in the Afghan city of Jalalabad and the wider Nangharhar Province. He says attacks by militants have driven his family and other members of the Sikh community abroad.
Afghanistan's Taliban rulers have begun imposing Hudood punishments for what Islamic Shari'a law considers serious crimes. But many Afghans are questioning whether the Taliban has the religious authority, legal right, and the best interests of the nation in mind in imposing strict punishments.
There is a long history of keeping pigeons in the Afghan capital, Kabul. In the past, some pigeons were bought and sold for the equivalent of hundreds of dollars, but prices have plunged along with incomes since the Taliban retook power in August 2021.
Fatima Amiri lost an eye in a suicide attack on a private college in Kabul on September 30. Just two weeks later, she passed her university entrance exams and plans to study computer science. The Taliban has barred female students from choosing many other university courses.
Weeks after a suicide bomber killed 58 people, many of them women and children, at a Kabul education center, their lives are being honored through book drives to stock the shelves of new libraries.
Pakistan has arrested around 1,500 Afghan refugees, including women and children, in recent weeks for allegedly living in the South Asian nation illegally. Afghans fear the mass arrests are part of a new crackdown on the millions of Afghan refugees and migrants residing in Pakistan.
A border clash between Taliban forces and the Pakistani military at the Spin Boldak-Chaman crossing has left one Pakistani border guard dead.
Reporters Without Border (RSF) has called for the completion of an investigation into the 2020 killing of RFE/RL Afghan service reporter Mohammad Ilyas Dayee.
The director of a 1,000-bed rehabilitation center for drug addicts in Kabul says they don't have enough basic food, medicine, and clothes for patients. Many rehabilitation centers have closed since international charities cut or reduced funding after the Taliban returned to power in August 2021.
The Taliban authorities in the western province of Herat have prohibited the sale of animal testicles, saying the practice of consuming the delicacy is un-Islamic. But locals say the order is damaging to businesses and unnecessary, considering the bigger issues the country is facing.
Women in Kabul are experiencing new hurdles to enjoying even the simplest pleasures, like taking a bath or spending a day at the amusement park with their kids.
The Taliban has cracked down on universities in Afghanistan in recent weeks. University campuses have become a hotbed of anti-Taliban protests led by female students. In the latest incident, the Taliban beat a group of women who held a rally outside their university in Badakhshan Province.
The Taliban-led Afghan government says Afghanistan faces difficulties related to climate change and development assistance from the international community is needed to reduce the negative effects.
Two gay Afghan men have told RFE/RL they live in constant fear under Taliban rule and have to meet their partners in secret. In a January report, Human Rights Watch found LGBT people in Afghanistan faced a"desperate situation and grave threats to their safety."
The United Nations human rights office has voiced concern over the detention of five people after the Taliban disrupted a press conference in Kabul intended to launch a new women's movement.
Since the Taliban retook power in August 2021, the Afghan economy has gone into freefall. Even the banknotes themselves are falling to pieces, with no new banknotes issued since the militant group's takeover.
An explosion hit a bus carrying Taliban administration employees in Kabul early on November 2, police said, wounding seven people.
Teachers have set up a secret education center in a poor neighborhood of the Afghan capital, Kabul, to teach female students aged 11 and above. The Taliban closed most secondary schools for girls after taking power in August 2021, and the militant group has not said when they will reopen.
Smoking shisha had become a popular pastime among men in Afghanistan in recent years. But the Taliban has issued a fatwa, or Islamic decree, banning hookahs. The owners of shisha cafes say the move will bankrupt them.
A new, female-only library in Kabul has become an educational oasis for Afghan girls and women who have been denied access to further learning.
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