A Russian pilot who was missing presumed dead after his plane was shot down three decades ago during the Soviet intervention in Afghanistan has been found alive and wants to come home, Russian military veterans said Friday.

Gunmen dressed as U.S. soldiers and traveling in a captured Humvee set off a suicide bomb and then tried to shoot their way into the Afghan Interior Ministry before being killed by government forces Wednesday, security officials said. It’s not clear who carried out the attack — one of at least three that occurred in Afghanistan on Wednesday — that targeted the Interior Ministry’s compound a few hundred yards from Kabul’s airport and a coalition air base where Americans and their allies train Afghan forces.

A gunbattle raged between Afghan security forces and a handful of militants following a series of explosions in the eastern city of Jalalabad on Sunday that killed at least four people and wounded at least 20, officials said. At least three explosions were heard at the start of what appeared to be a coordinated attack, Attahullah Khogyani, a spokesman for the Nangarhar provincial governor said. The firefight was taking place in a building housing the state accounts office.

Afghan officials said explosives were hidden inside the mosque, which was also being used as a voter registration center. The bombing is the latest in a series of attacks on election-related sites.

Before his arrest, Haji Juma Khan worked with the CIA and the DEA while aiding the Taliban and trading tons of heroin and opium. By Johnny Dwyer.

Shakila Zareen, 23, lost much of her face after being shot by her husband but, after multiple surgeries and seeing her hopes of resettlement dashed, she has a new home in Vancouver.

An American soldier has pleaded guilty to being part of a "kill team" who deliberately murdered Afghan civilians for sport last year. Army Specialist Jeremy Morlock, 23, told a military court he had helped to kill three unarmed Afghans. "The plan was to kill people, sir," he told an army judge in Fort Lea, near Seattle, after his plea.

At least 23 people were killed and more than a dozen wounded in multiple suicide bombings and attacks in Afghanistan on Saturday, officials said, the latest in a series of assaults in the war-torn country. In the biggest attack, Taliban militants stormed an army base in the western province of Farah overnight, killing at least 18 soldiers.

Afghanistan’s government rejected a surprise Taliban overture for peace talks with the U.S., insisting the insurgent group that controls or contests nearly half the country needs to cease fighting first. In an unexpected statement on Wednesday, the Taliban reached out to the American people asking them to pressure President Donald Trump and “war-mongering” congressmen to end the near 17-year-old “occupation.”

The BBC estimate, which it said was based on conversations with more than 1,200 individual local sources in all districts of the South Asian country, was significantly higher than the most recent assessment by the NATO-led coalition of the Taliban’s presence. The coalition said on Tuesday that the Taliban contested or controlled only 44 percent of Afghan districts as of October 2017.

Interior Ministry says 4 suspects have been detained, Taliban-linked Haqqani Network is responsible.

At least 95 people have been killed and 158 were wounded in a powerful suicide blast in the Afghan capital, Kabul. The Taliban claimed responsibility for Saturday's assault, the third major attacks in the past seven days. Attackers blew up an explosives-packed ambulance near an interior ministry building on a busy and heavily-guarded street in Kabul's centre at lunch time. The Jamhuriat hospital, government offices, businesses and a school are close to the site of the blast.

Shakil Afridi has languished in jail for years — since 2011, when the Pakistani doctor used a vaccination scam in an attempt to identify Osama bin Laden's home, aiding U.S. Navy Seals who tracked and killed the al-Qaida leader.

Gunmen stormed a luxury hotel in Kabul and killed at least six people including a Ukrainian, sparking a 12-hour battle with Afghan forces backed by Norwegian troops that left terrified guests scrambling to escape. Officials said the death toll from the attack on the six-storey Intercontinental Hotel, claimed by the Taliban, could rise as staff were still checking rooms.

The U.S. Army is working on a plan that would send an additional 1,000 U.S. troops to Afghanistan to boost its forces in the region, The Washington Post reported Sunday. The Army is preparing the proposals, which will recommend sending the extra forces this spring to join the 14,000 troops already stationed in Afghanistan, as part of broader efforts to combat the Taliban, senior military officials told the newspaper.

Pakistan has been accused of playing a "double game" and harbouring "terrorists" by Nikki Haley, the US ambassador to the UN, as the war of words continues between the two countries over military aid. Haley's comments come a day after President Donald Trump threatened to cut aid to Pakistan for allegedly lying to the US and offering "little help" in hunting "terrorists" in neighbouring Afghanistan.

A US service member was killed on Monday in the Achin District of Afghanistan's Nangarhar Province, the US military said. The service member's name is not being immediately disclosed pending notification of next of kin. Four other service members were wounded during the combat engagement. Two service members are in stable condition and being treated at a medical facility, the military said.

Kabul residents who can afford it, like the families of Samim Sediqi (at left) and his friend Iqbal, are moving to new apartment blocks in the neighborhood of Qasaba. Life there is easier—and safer—than downtown, where Taliban attacks are a threat.

Islamic State claimed responsibility for a suicide attack on a compound of Afghanistan's national intelligence agency in Kabul on Monday, that killed at least five people and wounded two.

People on the streets of Kabul call Abbas Alizada the “Afghan Bruce Lee.” After his striking resemblance to the Chinese martial arts icon made him a social media star, he took a year to work on himself and become even more like his hero. His makeover was a smashing success. Today, Abbas uses his celebrity to inspire other young Afghan athletes, but fame has come with a price – he now must be wary every time he leaves his house.