Afghanistan

JALALABAD, Afghanistan (AP) — The workers were sleeping on the mountainside where they had spent a long day harvesting pine nuts in eastern Afghanistan. Some were in tents, others lay outside under the stars, when the U.S. airstrike tore into them.

Only hours before the Sept. 19 strike, the businessman who hired them had heard there was a drone over the mountain and called Afghanistan’s intelligence agency to remind an official his workers were there — as he’d notified the agency days earlier.

KABUL, Afghanistan (AP) — Afghans headed to the polls on Saturday to elect a new president amid high security and Taliban threats to disrupt the elections, with the rebels warning citizens to stay home or risk being hurt.

Still at some polling stations in the capital voters lined up even before the centers opened, while in others election workers had yet to arrive by poll opening time.

Imam Baksh, who works as a security guard, said he wasn’t worried about his safety as he stood waiting to mark his ballot, wondering who he would vote for.

LASHKAR GAH, Afghanistan, Sept. 23 (Xinhua) -- Multiple civilians, mostly women and children, were feared killed after an airstrike struck a house where a wedding ceremony was underway in Afghanistan's southern province of Helmand overnight, a local source said Monday.

"Two separate airstrikes were conducted in Musa Qala district Sunday night. One strike killed and wounded 18 militants in Konjak village but the other strike caused massive civilian casualties in Shah-wa-Harrus locality," Abdul Majid Akhundzada from provincial council told Xinhua.

KABUL, Afghanistan (AP) — Anti-Taliban raids by Afghan forces backed by U.S. airstrikes killed at least 40 civilians attending a wedding party in the southern Helmand province, Afghan officials said.

The civilian deaths in Sunday night’s raids on Taliban hideouts further rattled Afghanistan amid an upsurge in violence that’s followed the collapse this month of U.S.-Taliban peace talks to end America’s longest war.

KABUL, Afghanistan (AP) — Police in Afghanistan are one of the country’s most-criticized security forces, denigrated as corrupt and inept. Yet Interior Minister Massoud Andarabi says police are also the hardest hit, taking 70% of all casualties among government forces, dozens of whom die each day in relentless attacks by Taliban and Islamic State insurgents.

KABUL, Sept 20 (NNN-AGENCIES) — A U.S. drone strike intended to hit Daesh hideout in Afghanistan killed at least 30 civilians resting after a day’s labour in the fields, officials said.

The attack on Wednesday night also injured 40 people after accidentally targeting farmers and labourers who had just finished collecting pine nuts at mountainous Wazir Tangi in eastern Nangarhar province, officials said.

“The workers had lit a bonfire and were sitting together when a drone targeted them,” tribal elder Malik Rahat Gul said.

KABUL (Reuters) - A deadly suicide bombing this week near an election rally in central Afghanistan where President Ashraf Ghani was due to speak came as a sharp reminder of the risks to a ballot set for the end of next week in the shadow of failed peace talks.

KABUL (Reuters) - Gunmen and at least one suicide bomber attacked a government building in eastern Afghanistan on Wednesday, wounding nine people including a child and a woman, officials said.

Attackers detonated explosives outside the building, used for the distribution of electronic identity cards, in the city of Jalalabad in eastern Nangarhar province, said the provincial governor’s spokesman and a provincial council member.

Gunmen then poured into the building and fighting is ongoing, they said.

KABUL (Reuters) - Taliban suicide attackers killed at least 30 people in Afghanistan on Tuesday, their deadliest bombing taking place near an election rally by President Ashraf Ghani, although he was unhurt.

The attacks happened 11 days before Afghanistan’s presidential elections, which Taliban commanders have vowed to violently disrupt, and follow collapsed peace talks between the United States and the insurgent group.

KABUL (Reuters) - Afghan households and businesses in about a third of the country have been hit by blackouts after electricity pylons in the northern province of Baghlan were blown up over the weekend, the main power utility said on Monday.

The utility, Da Afghanistan Breshna Sherkat (DABS), said three pylons carrying 220 KW of electricity imported from neighboring Uzbekistan had been destroyed on Sunday, cutting power in 11 of the country’s 34 provinces, including the capital, Kabul.