Standing in a hole dug into a barren Afghan mountainside, you can just about see Rukhshana’s face poking above the surface.
Surrounding her is a group of Taliban picking up rocks from the ground and, one by one, hurling them at the terrified young woman.
Her agonised cries grow louder and louder as the barrage of rocks strikes her with sickening thuds.
In a whitewashed basement in a village south of Kabul, a dozen young women bustle about, stirring cauldrons of bubbling cherries and plums, and sticking labels on glass jam jars. Ventures like this are one of the rare spaces where women are still able to gain skills and employment in Taliban-ruled Afghanistan.
It is run by Najia, a 47-year-old Afghan entrepreneur and mother of nine children who was married at the age of 14.
If the authorities hadn’t barred girls and young women from secondary schools and universities, many of the women in this workshop, including Naija’s daughters, would be studying for a different kind of future.
Haji Najibullah appeared unbothered as he walked into Manhattan federal court earlier this week to learn whether he would face life behind bars for his role in brutal violence during his time as a Taliban commander – including the 2008 kidnapping of US journalist David Rohde.
Najibullah, who walked into the courtroom in shackles at about 9.50am Monday, sporting khaki jail garb and a black skullcap, could even be seen grinning at various points before proceedings started.
The Taliban are hunting down women who took part in rare anti-hijab protests in Afghanistan, The Telegraph can reveal.
Residents said authorities were carrying out door-to-door raids across Herat to track down Afghans who appeared in videos of the demonstrations, which took place on Tuesday.
At least two people, including a 14-year-old boy, were killed when security forces opened fire on protesters gathered in Herat to demonstrate against mandatory hijab orders.
The protests erupted in response to a Taliban directive ordering women to wear a “proper hijab” – defined as having the face and body completely covered with only the eyes visible. Women found violating the rule face unspecified punitive measures, the directive said.
Video footage verified by the Telegraph shows Taliban fighters violently suppressing anti-government protests. The clips show Taliban fighters striking protesters with large sticks and batons.
Parwana Malik was just nine years old when her father sold her as a bride to a man in his 50s, desperate to find enough money to feed his family.
As tears streamed down his face, Abdul Malik pleaded with the groom to show mercy to his little girl.
‘This is your bride. Please take care of her. You are responsible now, please don’t beat her,’ he said.
As dawn breaks, hundreds of men gather at a dusty square in Chaghcharan, the capital of Ghor province in Afghanistan.
They line the roadside with weary faces, hoping someone will come along offering any work. It will determine whether their families eat that day.
The likelihood of success, however, is low.
Juma Khan, 45, has found just three days of work in the past six weeks that paid between 150 to 200 Afghani ($2.35-$3.13; £1.76-£2.34) per day.
This is the Glory of Islam.
The Taliban has formally recognised child marriages under a sweeping new family law regulation that sets out rules for marriages involving minors and establishes specific guidelines governing ‘virgin girls’.
The 31-page article regulation called ‘Principles of Separation Between Spouses’ outlines rules governing the dissolution of marriages under an endless list of religious and legal conditions.
These include child marriage, breastfeeding relations, forced separation, missing husbands, apostasy and accusations of adultery.
The federal government officially broke ground Monday in Ottawa on a national memorial to the sacrifice of Canadians during more than a dozen years of war in Afghanistan.
The monument, which has a controversial design history, will be located on LeBreton Flats in the national capital, near the Canadian War Museum.
It is intended to recognize the contributions of those who served in Afghanistan and those who supported them.
Homeland Security Secretary Kristi Noem has confirmed that the Trump administration is reassessing hundreds of thousands of aliens allowed in willy-nilly by the Biden administration with little to no vetting.
Pakistan’s defence minister has said the country is in “open war” with Afghanistan, after Islamabad launched airstrikes on Kabul as part of a wave of attacks across the country.
“Our patience has now run out,” said Khawaja Muhammad Asif following the attacks.
The strikes came after the Afghan Taliban announced a major offensive against Pakistani military posts near the border on Thursday night.
The latest attacks follow months of clashes between the two neighbouring nations, despite agreeing to a fragile ceasefire in October.
I wish them a long and bloody conflict.
Pakistan VS Afghanistan.
Both sides chant "Allahu Akbar".
Both sides praise Allah for killing the other side.Fewer evil people in this world.
Good luck to both sides. pic.twitter.com/hrLFjaC0lX— Eli Afriat 🇮🇱 (@EliAfriatISR) February 26, 2026
There is an unchangeable “truth” that goes with a Canadian flag draped over a Canadian soldier’s casket and hundreds of patriots standing on a bridge saluting that can’t be erased no matter how powerful the person doing the erasing may be.
Trump was definitely out of line, Canada’s troops were exemplary.
Afghanistan is the most misogynistic nation on Earth. Now those attitudes have been brought to Britain.
What role are Afghan nationals playing in the recent spate of sexual offences carried out by illegal male migrants? This question is becoming more urgent than ever, with polling showing that most Britons now believe that the small-boats crisis poses a serious threat to the safety of women and girls.
An Afghan national has been charged with the first-degree murder of his wife after he allegedly committed an honor killing in Washington state over the belief she was having an affair, local media reported, citing the King County Prosecuting Attorney’s Office.
Sayed Sadat, 37, of Auburn, called police to his home on the morning of November 23, where he was said to have confessed to killing 43-year-old Geety Sadat.
On Friday President Donald Trump announced his administration would pause asylum processes and stop issuing visas to Afghans in response to the shooting of two National Guardsmen, one of whom later died. It was an Afghan national, Rahmanullah Lakanwal, admitted into the United States through a Biden-era program, who allegedly shot and killed Specialist Sarah Beckstrom and critically injured Staff Sgt. Andrew Wolfe.
Of course, the propaganda press insisted this was an isolated tragedy and certainly not evidence of a failed system.
Afghan national admitted via Operation Allies Welcome charged with making terroristic threat, DHS says
An Afghan national was arrested this week after posting a video of himself on TikTok indicating he was building a bomb with an intended target of the Fort Worth area in Texas, the Department of Homeland Security (DHS) told Fox News.
Court records show that Mohammad Dawood Alokozay was charged at the state level with making a terroristic threat.
