Afghanistan

Afghanistan's singers flee Taliban violence

The BBC spoke with six singers who crossed the border to Pakistan illegally and are now living in hiding. One said he feared he would be executed if he stayed in Afghanistan.

The Taliban have banned music and are accused of executing a folk singer in northern Baghlan province in August.

The militant group has not responded to the allegation.

Singer Fawad Andarabi's son Jawad told the Associated Press that his father was shot in the head at the family's farm in the Andarab valley.

Taliban kill civilians in resistance stronghold

Footage from a dusty roadside in Panjshir shows a man wearing military gear surrounded by Taliban fighters. Gunfire rings out and he slumps to the ground.

It is not clear if the man killed was an army member - combat uniforms are common in the region. In the video a bystander insisted he was a civilian.

The BBC has established there have been at least 20 such deaths in Panjshir.

One of the victims was a shopkeeper and father-of-two called Abdul Sami.

Taliban claim to have taken Panjshir Valley

The group posted footage online of their fighters raising their flag there on Monday.

Resistance fighters however said they were still present in "all strategic positions" and "continue to fight".

Their leader has called for a "national uprising" against the Taliban.

In an audio recording posted on social media Ahmad Massoud, leader of the National Resistance Front of Afghanistan (NRF), blamed the international community for legitimising the Taliban and giving them military and political confidence.

Taliban celebrate victory as last US troops leave Afghanistan

Shaky video footage distributed by the Taliban showed fighters entering the airport after the last US troops flew out on a C-17 aircraft a minute before midnight, ending a hasty and humiliating exit for Washington and its NATO allies.

"It is a historical day and a historical moment," Taliban spokesman Zabihullah Mujahid told a news conference at the airport after the troops left. "We are proud of these moments, that we liberated our country from a great power."

Deadly bomb attacks strike Kabul airport; airlift thrust into chaos

The attacks have effectively shutting down the Western airlift of Afghans desperate to flee.

There was no complete death toll, but video images uploaded by Afghan journalists showed dozens of bodies of people killed in tightly packed crowds outside the airport.

A watery ditch by the airport fence was filled with bloodsoaked corpses, some being fished out and laid in heaps on the canal side while wailing civilians searched for loved ones. The Pentagon said "a number" of American service members were killed. Sources said at least 11 marines and a Navy medic were dead.

Biden vows to complete evacuations despite airport attack

"We must complete this mission and we will," he said. He also vowed to hunt down the perpetrators.

More than 100,000 people have been evacuated from Kabul, which fell to the Taliban on 15 August.

But many more Afghans have been rushing to the airport ahead of the 31 August deadline for US forces to leave.

Mr Biden vowed to complete the mission, adding "we will not be deterred by terrorists".

Thursday's attacks happened at about 18:00 local time (13:30 GMT).

Taliban tell working women to stay at home

"It's a very temporary procedure," spokesman Zabihullah Mujahid said.

The Taliban, which enforced a strict version of Islamic law when they ran Afghanistan before 2001, retook full control of the country nine days ago.

The UN has highlighted "credible" reports of abuses by the Taliban, notably restrictions on women.

UN Human Rights High Commissioner Michelle Bachelet said on Tuesday that women's rights were a "fundamental red line".

In his news conference in Kabul on Tuesday, the Taliban spokesman also addressed the US-led evacuation from the capital, Kabul.

US orders civilian jets to join evacuation

Eighteen aircraft will transfer people to third countries from safe sites outside Afghanistan, the Pentagon said.

Many thousands of Afghans are crowded outside Kabul airport, desperate to flee the country after the Taliban swept to power on 15 August.

President Joe Biden said on Sunday that the US had evacuated nearly 28,000 people in the past week.

"There is no way to evacuate this many people without pain and the heart-breaking images you see," Mr Biden told reporters at the White House, adding: "We have a long way to go and a lot can still go wrong."

Taliban carrying out door-to-door manhunt, report says

It said the militants have been going door-to-door to find targets and threaten their family members.

The hardline Islamist group has tried to reassure Afghans since seizing power in a lightning offensive, promising there would be "no revenge".

But there are growing fears of a gap between what they say and what they do.

The warning the group were targeting "collaborators" came in a confidential document by the RHIPTO Norwegian Center for Global Analyses, which provides intelligence to the UN.

Chaos at Kabul airport amid scramble to evacuate

Taliban militants controlling access to the airport have fired shots into the air to disperse approaching crowds.

Some 5,000 people have been evacuated in the last 24 hours, through the airport which is being run by US troops deployed to organise the evacuation.

It comes three days after the Taliban takeover of Afghanistan.

"It's absolutely hectic and chaos out there," one Western official told the Reuters news agency, as thousands of people remain desperate to leave, including Afghans who helped the US-led mission in the country over the past 20 years.