the Taliban

The translator told me that I owed my life to the Taliban commander we had been staying with.

The Taliban bring it up to the front lines from Kabul, and we buy it from them.

He gave reporters free access to meetings in which the bleak progress of the drive against the Taliban was bluntly discussed.

Apologists point to Stalinism and Nazism as murderous ideologies, as if their existence made Torquemada and the Taliban somehow acceptable.

Jones says the situation represents progress from a few years ago, when the Taliban appeared to have the upper hand and was gaining ground.

A Western official, who spoke on the condition of anonymity, said the attack made the talk of a peace deal with the Taliban seem "absurd. "

Secretary Clinton says defeating the Taliban and al-Qaida is not only in Pakistan's vital interest, but that of the United States as well.

A spokesman for the Nato-led force, Brigadier General Josef Blotz, said the Taliban were trying to reverse NATO gains.

Mr. Frans said that he doubted the Taliban claim of responsibility, and said the police had told him the probable motive was robbery.

Effectively, the Taliban create a complete blackout of any other source of information for these children.

The Pakistani schoolgirl hailed around the world for her efforts to stand up against the Taliban is out of the hospital.

A Taliban spokesman said the fate of these people in the East High Commission in the hands of the Taliban in Afghanistan.

A relief effort led by the U. S. and Pakistani governments would do much to convince Pakistanis to reject groups like the Taliban.

The Taliban in Afghanistan have told the BBC that there is no question of their entering into any kind of negotiations with Nato forces.

He said the failure of a recent voter registration drive in Ghazni showed how effectively the Taliban was cutting off the countryside.

Apparently sure of victory, the commanders said the Taliban would not negotiate with Mr Karzai.

But he said his coalition government will continue to pursue its own strategy in countering the Taliban insurgency.

A week ago, the Taliban did announce the beginning of their spring offensive.

In what one Western diplomat calls the Taliban's "madrassa, linear-thinking sort of way" this does not infuse talks with mutual trust.

"There is a degree of unanimity that there must be swift and effective action taken against the Taliban in Pakistan, " he said.

The Taliban claim responsibility for the execution-style street shooting, contending she was trying to spread Christianity.

The fact of the matter is that the stated positions of the Taliban and the United States are at the moment very different.

The Taliban have long been known as haters of modern technology, certainly the kind that comes out of the Western world they revile.

He said there are some members of the Taliban who joined simply out of ignorance, or to escape poverty.

He said the Taliban read the newspapers and are able to determine public opinion in the United States and Europe.

The Taliban said the strike proved the insurgent group's ability to hit the U. S. -led coalition whenever it chooses.

But he said spending could begin to come down in 2015, after the US is scheduled to hand over the lead in the battle against the Taliban.

He said the Taliban had changed tactics in recent months to fight a guerrilla war with suicide attacks and roadside bombs.

Time, rather than resources or appetite for fighting, is beginning to run out for the Taliban.

He said the Taliban did not prevent people from leaving during the suspended curfew.

But nobody knows the degree to which these things drive them to the Taliban, or what sort of progress might win them to the government.

He's got to be involved with the Taliban. How much, no one knows.

US Marines fighting to take the Taliban haven of Marjah have had to call in air support as they come under heavy fire.

Ten days earlier the Taliban crept up to the wall of his family compound and blew up one of the security towers, the report said.

The "narcoterrorist" label is often misused, but the Taliban are the real deal.

Indeed, this is one of the main reasons why the Taliban's rise was, at least initially, widely welcomed.

Commanders in Afghanistan repeatedly asked for support to deal with the reemergence of the Taliban, but these reinforcements did not arrive.

S. officials. Even in public, Gen. David Petraeus, the top commander in Kabul, has said the ISI retains ties with the Taliban.

Gen Mohammad Daud Daud is one of at least six people killed in the attack, claimed by the Taliban.

The Taliban, in asserting responsibility for the deaths, said the aid workers were foreign spies and spreading Christianity.

He gave me a 5p ballpoint pen to prove the point that the Taliban were not against education.

He said Washington and Tehran share strategic interests in combating Afghanistan's spiraling opium trade and the resurgence of the Taliban.

Part 4: Faces of Marja: Playing Cat and Mouse With the Taliban American troops try to stay one step ahead of the enemy.

Despite a heavy propaganda campaign to suggest otherwise, the subjugation of the Taliban has been a failure.

The attack on the World Food Program was the Taliban saying, "We do not approve of what you are doing. "

Several men walked over to the Talib and dropped money in his hands, donations to the Taliban.

It appears that most of those on the boat were fleeing Afghanistan, a country where Australian troops are currently fighting the Taliban.

If the US pulls out, the Taliban take over, as they have been as thoroughly aggravated as a hornet's nest kicked about like a football.

The Taliban claimed it shot down the helicopter, but the official said there was no sign of hostile fire.

But America, for one, is sceptical about any attempt to woo the Taliban leadership before NATO is in a stronger military position.

The US-led NATO troops have a difficult time trying to identify insurgents from civilians as the Taliban operate amongst the population.

But it illustrates the difficulties the West is facing, eight years into the war, even in areas where the Taliban no longer rule openly.

The British Defense Minister John Hutton says the killing of a senior rebel commander in Afghanistan is a significant blow to the Taliban.

Some of its soldiers and spooks sympathise with and help the Taliban, out of both ethnic-Pushtun fellow-feeling and strategic intent.

S. policies in Afghanistan and Pakistan that have failed to counter the Taliban or shore-up the two countries' U. S. -allied governments.

The strikes began shortly after an offer from the Taliban to put Osama bin Laden on trial in Afghanistan was rejected by the United States.

The Afghan Islamic Press news agency said the Taliban insurgents were responsible for the abduction.

According to official said the Taliban leader Cary Tahir (q ari tahir) is the U. S. aircraft attack planners.

Baasha Rutter said: "wipe out the Taliban's actions will continue until there were all wiped out Taliban, restoring governance. "

The opposition, casually described as "the Taliban" , is far from a unified force in a country of great ethnic complexity.

President Karzai did not directly refer to reconciliation talks with the Taliban during a speech in Kabul Wednesday.

It is widely believed that will include some sort of negotiation with some elements of the Taliban.

This picture was taken when hundreds of Afghan women came out on the street after the Taliban fled.

The Taliban, routed by U. S. -led and Afghan forces following the 2001 terrorist attacks on the United States, have been able to regroup.

Vesa said the Taliban attack also killed a policeman and a civilian died and 29 others injured.

And it is a deadly irony, because these funds add up to a huge amount of money for the Taliban.

The Taliban also appear to have had access to sophisticated military equipment and professionally drawn-up battle plans.

But in Mingora the Taliban still rule the roost, standing eyeball to eyeball with soldiers holed up in government buildings.

There was a cover story in NEWSWEEK [ " The Mind of the Taliban" ] that described how the Taliban survived.

The Taliban and other extremists run free and a multibillion-dollar gas pipeline would be a sitting duck in their destructive path.

The Taliban are not the only enemy along the fraught borderlands of the Afghan war.

But for those things to happen, the Taliban must see that the Afghan government and its foreign friends are winning, not losing.

The victims, who mostly belong to a tribe opposed to the Taliban, had been waiting for the United Nations food rations.

Be prepared to pay $6, 000 per truck, so the police will not tip off the Taliban.

He said talks are already underway, but the Taliban will not be allowed again to control Afghanistan like they did in 2001.

Mr Lieven thinks growing resentment at the hierarchical nature of Pakistani society has helped the Taliban.

The Taliban have been preemptively attacking the reintegration program, which is now receiving international support through a trust fund.

But only a few weeks ago, Rabbani voiced his frustration to the Afghan media that the Taliban would never soften their position.

The Taliban's former ambassador to Pakistan said the two sides recently had contacts in Saudi Arabia.

We begin in Afghanistan, where the latest attacks by the Taliban have claimed at least nine lives.

The Taliban immediately claimed responsibility for the attack, which also left at least four others wounded.

And the intense bombing intended to flush out the last of the Taliban troops is destroying or burning much of what remains.

The Taliban have used portable heat-seeking missiles against allied aircraft, a fact that has not been publicly disclosed by the military.

Burhanuddin Rabbani had been heading a government peace council set up to build contacts with the Taliban.

Yazid was also responsible for maintaining al Qaeda's relationships with other terrorist groups, like the Taliban.

Such comments are, on the face of it, nothing new for Mr Karzai, who previously invited the Taliban leader, Mullah Omar, to talks in Kabul.

(Along with the Taliban, Hamas was also one of the groups that had no kind words for Obama's winning the prize).

But few expect the jirga to reach agreement on what compromises with the Taliban the Afghan government should be prepared to accept.

Only a clean and an effective administration might inoculate Afghans against the lure of the Taliban's shadow government.

Nothing could cheer the Taliban more than seeing General McChrystal out on his ear.

Its precarious stability will be jeopardised further if Mr Zardari proves to be right and the war against the Taliban is being lost.

If the Taliban can be beaten here, the war might be salvaged.

The U. N envoy did not name any insurgent leaders, such as fugitive chief of the Taliban insurgents, Mullah Omar.

S. -led war against the Taliban has led to calls for a change of strategy including the option of sending more troops to bolster security.

The U. S. president pledged to also use diplomacy and development to help end the Taliban insurgency.

The question, however, is whether displeasure at the Taliban is enough to overcome fear of the Taliban.

Hazrat Ali is from a poor farming family in Swat. He joined the Taliban a year ago, when he was 13.

Coalition troops in Afghanistan mounted their biggest offensive against the Taliban since the start of the eight-year war.

For all that, the government was right to take military action to drive the Taliban from Swat.

The Taliban clearly arrived in the U. S. can only choose one site of the incident path.

NEARLY seven years after the toppling of the Taliban, Afghanistan's future is still up for grabs.

The Afghan government has prevented the Taliban from seizing control of any significant district centre or town.

After the meeting Afghan President Hamid Karzai said just fighting the Taliban is no longer an option.

More than a third of Afghanistan's eligible voters turned out on September 18th, defying the Taliban to vote in parliamentary elections.

The next most wanted figure is the Taliban leader Mullah Omar, with a $10m reward in the US for his capture.

The Taliban have strongly denied that they were responsible for a suicide car bomb attack that destroyed a hospital in eastern Afghanistan.

Having previously failed to control Swat, the Taliban's regional base, with a division, the generals sent in three divisions.

But it is thought he might withdraw, providing a convenient pretext to avoid a poll that will benefit mainly the Taliban.

But Kilcullen said there was a vicious cycle that began with government corruption, creating the space for the Taliban to expand.

He said residents worry the military's attempts to dislodge the Taliban could fail once again.

The letters showed what listeners are aching to hear most is music, banned as un-Islamic by the Taliban.

It seems a paradox, but in the 1990s the Taliban leadership did not see themselves as oppressors of women but as their defenders.

"I grabbed the microphone and said, 'Here comes the Taliban, ' " she recalled with a chuckle.

One of Mr Karzai's ministers said that, so long as the Taliban were "winning" , reconciliation would be "an empty phrase" .

US again began to ship the counterfeit machines for the Afghan war, this time for the fight against al-Qaida and the Taliban.

Mr Karzai has appointed a body known as the High Peace Council, charged with opening negotiations with the Taliban at every level.

He promised to end the war in Iraq, sort out the Taliban, provide health care for all and erect a cap-and-trade system to save the planet.

Even short of that, the Taliban's penetration of Pakistan's cities and institutions is cause for serious worry.

Mehmet Aksoy, the designer of the Kars monument, says that the government risks being seen as "the Taliban" if it presses its demands.

General McChrystal sees counter-insurgency as an "argument" between the Taliban and the Afghan government, backed by the West.

Moscow is torn between wanting Nato to fail in Afghanistan, and not wanting to see a return to the Taliban.

"It is clearly a problem for us, leadership of the Taliban in my area are directed by leaders in Pakistan, " he said.

Unlike the anti-Soviet mujahideen, they argue, the Taliban, al-Qaeda and their allies do not have the support of a superpower.

She said the Taliban singles out women in government posts because they know that killing them will garner more publicity.

I was in a madrasa when the Taliban were in government and I only joined them after the American occupation.

I'd also been told if the talks were to continue the Taliban needed to show a commitment to break from al Qaeda.

Kabul, Afghanistan: A fortune teller listens to a woman as another awaits her turn. Fortune telling was banned under the Taliban regime.

And yet, with perhaps 15% of his tribesmen openly supporting the Taliban, "For how long can I control my area? "

Suddenly, a Kiowa attack helicopter swept in low and fired a rocket toward the Taliban position, leaving a rush of air and a trail of smoke.

The transatlantic alliance has survived the end of the cold war. But as it battles the Taliban in Afghanistan, its problems are acute.

Talks with the Taliban would allow him to claim that the big green exit sign is in sight.

And they will embolden the Taliban into thinking that, after eight years of flea-bites, the American dog is about to roll over.

Mr Karzai's officials said that the Taliban would be invited to attend the gathering, to be held in the coming months.

The attack on such a powerful and high-profile official shows just how strong the Taliban insurgency is becoming.

But the Afghan government remains weak, and this is as much of a problem as the strength of the Taliban.

The canal would become the new defensive line, keeping the Taliban out in the west while protecting the population on the other side.

Qatari officials did not respond to requests for comment about the Taliban presence.

The Taliban, headquartered in the provincial capital of Quetta, use Baluchistan's 800-mile-long border to slip in and out of Afghanistan.

At dinner, Admiral Mullen repeated the long-held view that the Taliban leadership is hiding in the province of Baluchistan.

The Taliban said it had carried out the bombing as revenge against villagers who assisted the security forces.

I negotiated with Saddam's diplomats at the U. N. Later , I traveled to Kabul and served in Afghanistan after the fall of the Taliban .

The officials said the four dead tribesmen were kidnapped by the Taliban about 10 days ago.

The Taliban seized on the shooting, describing it as "genocide" and pledging to help victims' families take revenge on the US.

The German Army has been heavily criticized for calling in an US air strike on the Taliban when many civilians were nearby.

Many of the Taliban's new leaders are being courted by Al Qaeda and other extremists who do not support making a deal with President Karzai.

The United States should seize upon the death of bin Laden to promote urgent peace negotiations with the Taliban leadership.

The fact that the Taliban has safe havens across the border in Pakistan is also a huge problem for Nato's nation-builders.

It seems unlikely that the Afghan government will grow strong enough to dictate terms to the Taliban.

Not many people in Washington or London had ever heard of Ghulam Haider Hamidi, but the Taliban were scared to death of him.

The Taliban insurgency in the south is not about to go away, but Afghanistan's army can probably keep it at bay.

A spokesman for the Taliban denied that, saying that on the contrary, the Kandahar attack had been planned for some time.

Mr. Obama said he was struck by the courage of Afghans who went to polling stations despite the threats of violence by the Taliban.

"The US is still not willing to negotiate directly with the Taliban, as the Taliban want, " he says.

Having struggled so hard it was particularly hard to see her own daughter, now 24, denied education under the Taliban.

Do you think there is a wedge now between the Taliban and al-Qaeda out of this?

But few observers expected much from the gathering, even before the Taliban fired rockets at it.

But unlike Sunnis in Iraq, the Pashtun and the Taliban represent the majority of Afghans, at least in the south.

Farther south, in Helmand, where the British are deployed, the Taliban man roadblocks in the Sangin valley.

On the heights above, British marines at the sharp end of NATO's war against the Taliban routinely come under fire from guns and rockets.

These form part of the "war on terror" , supposedly by helping seize vessels linked to the Taliban and al-Qaeda.

To Help Defeat The Taliban, The International Community Has Stepped Up Its Road-Building Campaign Across Afghanistan.

Already Afghanistan's ethnic minorities have begun to re-arm in the face of negotiations with the Taliban.

Osama bin Laden , if he 's alive, celebrated his 50th birthday on Saturday, and his friends in the Taliban prayed for his long life .

German commanders ordered the strike on two fuel tankers believed to have been hijacked by the Taliban.

In parts of the south, however, intimidation and apathy kept turnout extremely low. "The Taliban are patrolling the area. "

It promises to be a bloody battle marked by urban warfare, which has rarely occurred in clashes with the Taliban.

a consensual approach to poppy eradication that does not drive farmers over to the Taliban by threatening their livelihoods.

As one of the factions in Afghanistan the Taliban, "Haqqani Network" members of the border in eastern Afghanistan are frequent.

Inevitably, this will mean incorporating some of the Taliban and their mostly Pashtun supporters into the political fold.

The Taliban will take the talks as further evidence that NATO will soon give up and withdraw. Plainly, they must be proved wrong.

Mr Haqqani, now said to be bedridden, was a minister for border and tribal affairs when the Taliban ruled Afghanistan.

"This was an act by a small ruthless minority, which is what the Taliban are, " said Richard Holbrooke.

Unlike the anti-Soviet mujahideen, who were backed by America, Saudi Arabia and Pakistan, the Taliban have no superpower sponsor.

Added to this was a large dose of guile to fool the Taliban into thinking that NATO would use the main road.

I don't think that they're going to tolerate the kind of violence that the Taliban have inflicted on their people as the 'new normal.

The transmission lines were blown up in 1980 by anti-Soviet mujahideen, then fixed by the Taliban government in 1996.

Seamus Murphy's new book, A Darkness Visible: Afghanistan, documents the rise of the Taliban and the impact of the U. S. invasion.

Despite the widespread violence in Afghanistan by the Taliban and other Islamic militants, Percovich said he doesn't feel threatened.

Yet others, including one of the Taliban escapes, gainsay the idea that the breakout had inside assistance.

will get what they want. . . they're tapping the metal right out of Afghanistan as our troops fight and die against the taliban.

Last week a woman in Badakhshan was stoned to death for adultery, the second such killing since the Taliban's overthrow in 2001.

He couldn't talk to the Taliban leader Mullah Mohammed Omar, he said, because he couldn't be found and neither could the Taliban Council.

Her blog told about her experiences in areas controlled by the Taliban. She and her friends had disobeyed the ban by attending school.

The stakes are high: failure would not only bring back the Taliban and al-Qaeda, but embolden jihadists around the world.

The Taliban claimed responsibility for the bombing, saying the target had been the embassy, Reuters reported.

The war against the Taliban is gradually being framed by its opponents as a fiscal issue.

The NATO-led International Security Assistance Force force has suspended combat operations against the Taliban during the election week.

With the war in stalemate now, as it was 20 years ago, Mr Steele argues for peace talks with the Taliban and the regional powers.

In 2001, the United States overthrew the Taliban, but banditry, tribal rivalries and drug related violence has left the nation unstable.

Much depends, too, on how the coalition does against the Taliban-led insurgency as the clock runs down.

Back at the Marines' camp, there has been a gun battle with the Taliban.

Obama is expected to discuss his plans for disrupting the terrorist group al-Qaida and for blunting the insurgency of the Taliban.

The Taliban are a Pushtun faction, not a national movement; their insurgency is largely limited to the southern half of the country.

The Taliban enjoy a haven in Pakistan (and perhaps the help of some of its spooks) but they have no state sponsor.

Some of the delegates may be sympathizers with the Taliban, although members of the hardline Islamist group were not invited.

In Afghanistan itself the Taliban have been adept at duping foreign forces into becoming their recruiters through the killing of civilians.

No wonder if the lives of the vast majority of Afghan women have not eased since the Taliban were bombed from power.

He disliked the "erratic actions" being taken by al-Qaeda, which he feared would undermine the Taliban experiment (he was right).

"We are not in direct contact with the Taliban, " he said.

Just look at how US aid the Taliban in the fight against the Soviet union and fast forward to how thing have turned out in Afghan now.

The plans presented by a US major had look like a targeted killing operation against the Taliban.

In 2007, when the Taliban took root around the town of Babaji, they were evicted by British forces helped by the militias.

As in Afghanistan, where the Taliban stepped up attacks during the election campaign, more bombings are likely in the coming months.

Instead the US accepts that the Taliban would have to meet these conditions at the end of talks.

Violence is at its worst level in Afghanistan since the fall of the Taliban in 2001.

S. Secretary of Defense Panetta has vowed to completely exterminating the Taliban, and do not give up.

"Who's to say that the Taliban won't just start coming back down here again, " he worries.

Recent suggestions from some Western officials that the Taliban are crumbling look to be exaggerated.

The Taliban took advantage of the curfew to lay mines around the city.

At the very least, say officers, NATO will not again be caught by surprise when, as expected, the Taliban step up the fight in the spring.

Upon his eventual release in May 2008, he headed straight for Quetta to rejoin the Taliban.

The Taliban are most likely to attempt more attacks in the coming ten days in an effort to encourage outsiders to waver further.

But the Taliban have a strong presence in the countryside, especially in southern and eastern areas along the border with Pakistan.

Q: Afghan President Karzai reportedly said days ago that the Afghan Government had a smooth dialogue with the Taliban.

This would mark a decisive change of nearly a decade of US strategy since the overthrow of the Taliban.

In Tajikistan, the French use an airfield as part of the war against the Taliban.

Meanwhile, the Taliban spokesman, Ahmadi, said militants would execute all hostages if the troops recklessly carried out a storm.

Indian officials are closely monitoring Pakistan's crackdown on insurgents, especially the ongoing military operation against the Taliban.

In the Taliban era, the city was more peaceful but women were confined to their homes.

Today I read that the Taliban used an 8 year old girl to carry an explosive charge which, of course, killed her when it was detonated.

Five Bangladeshi hostages flew home on Sunday more than seven months after they were kidnapped by the Taliban in Afghanistan.

Others, however, were excited to be crossing into Afghanistan with the groups al-Qaida sent to aid and instruct the Taliban.

Already there is a growing acceptance that some concessions to the Taliban are inevitable if there is to be genuine reconciliation.

Afghanistan quickly blamed Pakistan, India's rival for the deadliest blast in Kabul since the fall of the Taliban in 2001.

Pakistani military says it has arrested the spokesman for the Taliban in the restive Swat valley along with four other wanted "terrorists. "

My sources had told me Mullah Omar had let it be known the Taliban recognized they will not win the war by military means alone.

When al-Qaeda and the Taliban established a new haven over the border in Pakistan, the CIA's drones took the fight to them there as well.

After all, he observes, some of the Taliban commanders arrested by the Pakistanis were once favorites of the ISI.

In an effort to save our lives in the early days, I exaggerated what the Taliban could receive for us in ransom.

Vice- President Joe Biden rejects the call for an enlarged counter-insurgency campaign against the Taliban.

But many of the newly reported finds appear to be in zones that are dominated by the Taliban and have little infrastructure.

It is not known whether he was a member of the Taliban or being forced to act by the insurgents.

At the time of the 2001 war in Afghanistan, the Taliban were blamed for presiding over widespread poppy cultivation.

Initially the Taliban were unable to maintain sustained pressure on the country's south-central highlands.

In a very short period of time, the Taliban will come in and take over the government.

Public and political frustration is also growing after nine years of fighting the Taliban.

British forces described Mullah Mansur as a prominent local leader of the Taliban insurgency in Helmand province.

The darkness returned to the no-man's land contested by the Taliban and opposition forces north of the capital.

In NWFP this system, perhaps unfairly, has been blamed for ushering in the Taliban, and is now being hobbled.

Some cast it off after the Taliban's overthrow, but many more did not.

The claims have been loudly rejected, but in private Pakistani military men admit that corners of the army do indeed help the Taliban.

The company's employees had received repeated threats by phone from the Taliban and demands for money, General Salangi said.

Is it supposed to leave Afghanistan to the not-so-tender mercies of the Taliban and Pakistani intelligence?

And he invited members of the Taliban movement that had no ties to al-Qaida and wanted peace to return to their country.

Several attackers were killed in the Taliban attack on a base at an airfield outside Jalalabad, near the border with Pakistan.

Mehsud, the leader of the Taliban Movement of Pakistan, was killed by a missile-firing U. S. drone aircraft in South Waziristan in August.

And its members, announced by Mr Karzai, include many longtime enemies of the Taliban with whom they may refuse to parley.

No turnout figures have been disclosed, leaving it unclear how effective the Taliban's campaign of intimidation was in keeping voters away.

The Taliban said they shot the Americans in retaliation for the burning of copies of the Koran by soldiers at a US base last week.

After capturing four pickup trucks from the Afghan National Army, the Taliban took them to Kabul to be used in suicide bombings.