Kunduz

An Afghan passenger plane carrying at least 43 people was believed to have crashed in a snowstorm in the rugged Hindu Kush mountains Monday, and Western military forces were aiding in efforts to locate the wreckage and rescue any survivors. Those aboard the missing plane -- an old Russian model -- included at least five foreigners, according to provincial officials in the northern city of Kunduz, where the flight originated. The plane, an Antonov-24 turboprop operated by private Pamir airways, left at about 8:30 a.m. for the capital, Kabul, but disappeared amid the jagged peaks of the nearly 13,000-foot-high Salang Pass.

KABUL, Afghanistan - A suicide bomber attacked a popular sporting event Wednesday in northern Afghanistan, killing eight people including relatives of the Afghan parliamentary speaker as a crowd of thousands commemorated the coming Persian new year. Spectators said the attacker targeted the family of Abdul Rauf Ibrahimi, speaker of the lower house of parliament. Ibrahimi's brother, father, nephew and cousin were among the dead, said Amanuddin Quraishi, governor of Imam Sahib district in Kunduz province, where the attack took place.

An Afghan passenger plane carrying at least 43 people crashed Monday in a snowstorm in the rugged Hindu Kush mountains. The search for survivors was suspended after dark but was to resume Tuesday. Those aboard the missing plane included at least five foreigners, according to provincial officials in the northern city of Kunduz, where the flight originated. The plane, an aging Russian-built Antonov-24 turboprop operated by private Pamir Airways, left about 8:30 a.m. for Kabul, the capital, but disappeared amid the jagged peaks of the nearly 13,000-foot-high Salang Pass.

KABUL, Afghanistan - In her small village of Kalota, north of Kabul, the young woman named Hanisa was known to be headstrong and independent. At 22, she had persevered in school long enough to reach 12th grade, and she was determined to flout tradition and work outside her home. Hanisa had just left her house Saturday and was on her way to her first day of work as a village vaccination worker when three men on two motorcycles roared up behind her. She was shot at least six times and collapsed, bleeding profusely from abdominal wounds, according to Qais Qadiri, a spokesman for the governor's office in Kapisa province.

After a U.S. special operations force secured a compound outside Kandahar recently, Army 1st Lt. Ashley White was sent in to search and interview Afghan women. Just after she arrived, a homemade bomb exploded, killing her and two Army Rangers. White, 24, was the first female soldier to die in combat while performing a unique new role for the Army. She was part of an elite cultural support team, first sent to Afghanistan in January in an attempt to overcome daunting cultural barriers in the deeply conservative Islamic country.

KABUL, Afghanistan - A suicide bomber attacked a popular sporting event Wednesday in northern Afghanistan, killing eight people including relatives of the Afghan parliamentary speaker as a crowd of thousands commemorated the coming Persian new year. Spectators said the attacker targeted the family of Abdul Rauf Ibrahimi, speaker of the lower house of parliament. Ibrahimi's brother, father, nephew and cousin were among the dead, said Amanuddin Quraishi, governor of Imam Sahib district in Kunduz province, where the attack took place.

KABUL, Afghanistan - In her small village of Kalota, north of Kabul, the young woman named Hanisa was known to be headstrong and independent. At 22, she had persevered in school long enough to reach 12th grade, and she was determined to flout tradition and work outside her home. Hanisa had just left her house Saturday and was on her way to her first day of work as a village vaccination worker when three men on two motorcycles roared up behind her. She was shot at least six times and collapsed, bleeding profusely from abdominal wounds, according to Qais Qadiri, a spokesman for the governor's office in Kapisa province.

A roadside bomb killed four American soldiers in eastern Afghanistan on Monday, adding to the toll in what has already been the conflict's deadliest month for Western forces. The latest deaths push the number of coalition troops killed in July to at least 55 -- 30 of them American. U.S. military officials have forecast a bloody summer in Afghanistan, in part because thousands of newly arrived American troops are pushing into areas previously controlled by the Taliban.

Four German troops were killed Thursday in fighting in northern Afghanistan's Baghlan province, a one-day toll that is likely to stoke further antiwar sentiment in an important European ally. Though NATO spokesmen would not release details of the deaths, German defense officials said the four soldiers were killed in fighting that broke out after a German armored vehicle was attacked. Five German soldiers were wounded in the clash. In the southern city of Kandahar, a suicide car bombing killed at least six people at a compound used by foreign companies.

In California, melons are a highlight of the summer breakfast table. In Central Asia, they are a cultural obsession. And that has made for some interesting cross-pollination. In Afghanistan, Uzbekistan and China's Xinjiang region, hundreds of varieties ripen to perfection in the region's hot, dry summers, producing ultra-sweet, luscious fruits with unexpected flavors such as gardenia and vanilla. Melons overflow the bazaars and are piled by the roadsides. They are celebrated with special holidays; consumed for their medicinal properties; cooked, dried and even stored for the winter in special melon houses.

After a U.S. special operations force secured a compound outside Kandahar recently, Army 1st Lt. Ashley White was sent in to search and interview Afghan women. Just after she arrived, a homemade bomb exploded, killing her and two Army Rangers. White, 24, was the first female soldier to die in combat while performing a unique new role for the Army. She was part of an elite cultural support team, first sent to Afghanistan in January in an attempt to overcome daunting cultural barriers in the deeply conservative Islamic country.

A suicide bomber killed at least 33 people at an army recruitment center in northern Afghanistan on Monday, underscoring the vulnerability of Afghan security forces as they struggle to assume more responsibility for safeguarding the country from Taliban insurgents. The Taliban took responsibility for the attack, the insurgency's second strike on an army recruitment center in the city of Kunduz in 12 weeks. A suicide bombing at a different recruitment center Dec. 19 killed nine Afghan soldiers and police officers and injured a dozen other people.

A suicide bomber killed a district governor and six other people Thursday in a northern province of Afghanistan that has become increasingly emblematic of the Taliban movement's ability to strike far from its traditional strongholds in the south and east. The Taliban claimed responsibility for the attack in the district of Chardara in Kunduz province, where the insurgency is well entrenched. A spokesman, Zabiullah Mujahid, called the slain official, Wahid Omarkhel, an "active member of the stooge government" who was closely connected to "foreign invaders.

Insurgents took aim Sunday at Afghanistan's security forces, ambushing an army bus in the capital, Kabul, and storming an army recruitment center in the north of the country. At least eight Afghan soldiers and police were killed in the two attacks. The Afghan police and army are considered key to the West's exit strategy, which calls for the nation's forces to take over security responsibilities across the country in the next three years. That plan was endorsed at a NATO conference last month and again last week in a White House assessment of the Afghan conflict.

The pro-Western governor of a key northern Afghanistan province and at least 18 other people were killed Friday in a massive explosion as they prayed in a crowded mosque, officials said. Mohammed Omar, the governor of Kunduz province, had warned of the dangers of the growing influence of the Taliban and other insurgent groups in Afghanistan's north. His death was the latest in a string of deadly assaults on government officials, including the assassination last week of a deputy governor in Ghazni province.

A Taliban suicide squad stormed the compound of a development group working under contract to the U.S. government on Friday, killing at least three expatriate workers, a security guard and an Afghan police officer, officials said. All six attackers also died in the predawn assault in the northern city of Kunduz. At the outset of the strike, one of the assailants blew up a sport utility vehicle at the compound's gates; the other five were killed in a gun battle that followed, provincial police said.

A suicide bomber killed at least 33 people at an army recruitment center in northern Afghanistan on Monday, underscoring the vulnerability of Afghan security forces as they struggle to assume more responsibility for safeguarding the country from Taliban insurgents. The Taliban took responsibility for the attack, the insurgency's second strike on an army recruitment center in the city of Kunduz in 12 weeks. A suicide bombing at a different recruitment center Dec. 19 killed nine Afghan soldiers and police officers and injured a dozen other people.

The front line stretches across an oatmeal-brown mudscape, down one hill to the south and up another to the north. In the no man's land below lie the waffled foundations of what used to be the village of Chogha. Above hangs a freezing fog that screens the city of Kunduz, about 20 miles away, where as many as 30,000 Taliban fighters are making their last stand in northern Afghanistan.

An Afghan passenger plane carrying at least 43 people crashed Monday in a snowstorm in the rugged Hindu Kush mountains. The search for survivors was suspended after dark but was to resume Tuesday. Those aboard the missing plane included at least five foreigners, according to provincial officials in the northern city of Kunduz, where the flight originated. The plane, an aging Russian-built Antonov-24 turboprop operated by private Pamir Airways, left about 8:30 a.m. for Kabul, the capital, but disappeared amid the jagged peaks of the nearly 13,000-foot-high Salang Pass.

An Afghan passenger plane carrying at least 43 people was believed to have crashed in a snowstorm in the rugged Hindu Kush mountains Monday, and Western military forces were aiding in efforts to locate the wreckage and rescue any survivors. Those aboard the missing plane -- an old Russian model -- included at least five foreigners, according to provincial officials in the northern city of Kunduz, where the flight originated. The plane, an Antonov-24 turboprop operated by private Pamir airways, left at about 8:30 a.m. for the capital, Kabul, but disappeared amid the jagged peaks of the nearly 13,000-foot-high Salang Pass.