Kabul holds many glimpses of its Soviet past hidden in plain sight around its jumbled hillsides — sobering artifacts that now confront the United States and its allies as they begin pondering what their own legacy might be.

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Kabul’s Soviet Ruins Offer a Reminder of Imperial Ambitions

KABUL — At least five Afghan police officers and two civilians were killed Sunday when a car bomb was detonated outside the main police headquarters in Kandahar, officials said. Another 19 people, six of them police officers, were wounded in the blast, provincial officials said. Children were also among the victims. Read full article > >

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Car bomb kills seven outside police headquarters in Kandahar

Two British private security contractors working in Afghanistan are charged with carrying unlicensed AK-47s through the capital city, Kabul.

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Britons face Afghan gun charges

Among the throngs of inmates in downtown Kabul’s prison trying to prove they are not thieves or insurgents is a soft-spoken Sikh man with piercing black eyes. He is being held on a highly unusual charge: falsely claiming Afghan citizenship. Read full article > >

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Sikh’s detention reveals flaws in Afghan justice, nation’s religious intolerance

KABUL — Three Afghan civilians were killed on Thursday when a suicide bomber targeted a convoy of the NATO-led force in Afghanistan’s southern Helmand province, according to officials. A female civilian expatriate official from the coalition was hurt along with 30 other Afghan civilians in the attack in which the bomber used a vehicle outside the governor’s compound in Lashkar Gah, Helmand’s provincial capital. Read full article > >

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Bomber targets NATO convoy in Afghanistan; 3 killed

KABUL — A Toyota Corolla full of former Taliban officials and armed guards stopped in front of Abdul Salam Zaeef’s home in western Kabul this month, awaiting the man who helped direct the Taliban from Pakistan before his capture and detention at Guantanamo Bay. Read full article > >

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Former Taliban officials find new role

KABUL – Avalanches killed 15 or 16 people and cut off various roads in a rugged province of northeastern Afghanistan, officials reported on Tuesday. Authorities had begun to evacuate those endangered by the avalanches, which were caused by days of snowfall in impoverished Badakhshan province. The province shares a long border with Tajkistan. Read full article > >

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Avalanches kill at least 15 Afghans, close roads

KABUL — One week after President Hamid Karzai demanded that the United States hand over its military prison near Bagram airfield to Afghan officials by month’s end, opposition to the plan has emerged from human rights advocates appointed by Karzai. Read full article > >

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Karzai faces criticism over prison demand

KABUL, Afghanistan — A man in an Afghan army uniform opened fire on a group of Americans at a base in the south of the country, killing a U.S. soldier and wounding another, an Afghan military spokesman said Monday. Spokesman Gen. Mohammad Zahir Azimi said the gunman was also killed in the shootout on Sunday. “Right now, an investigation is going on to determine whether he really was a soldier or someone using an army uniform. And if he was a soldier, what caused the shooting,” Azimi said. Read full article > >

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Gunman in Afghan army uniform kills US soldier on base in south, Afghan military says

KABUL — Worried that U.S. troops could stay in Afghanistan beyond 2014, Iran is mounting an aggressive campaign to fuel anti-American sentiment here and convince Afghan leaders that a robust, long-term security partnership with Washington would be counterproductive, Afghan officials and analysts say. Read full article > >

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Iran strives to play spoiler in Afghanistan

People gathered from Beijing to Kabul to New York to celebrate the new year.

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Ringing In 2012, Around the World

Doctors say a 15-year-old Afghan girl will have to remain in hospital in Kabul for a month after being rescued from her husband and his family who had locked her up, starved and beaten her.

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VIDEO: Afghan girl in hospital after rescue

KABUL — Afghan officials have seized millions of dollars worth of armored vehicles and weapons from private security firms in recent weeks, a move that has exacerbated concerns about the government’s plan to replace the hired guns that protect convoys and installations with an unprepared state-run guard force. Read full article > >

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Afghanistan cracks down on contractors

The attack, which killed a member of Parliament, appeared to be the Taliban’s latest strike against Afghans with ties to the government in Kabul.

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Suicide Bomber Strikes Funeral in Northern Afghanistan

KABUL-The U.S. military acknowledged on Thursday that commanders in Afghanistan made serious mistakes during a cross-border raid last month in which 24 Pakistani police officers were killed. A report about the Nov. 25 incident found that “inadequate coordination by U.S. and Pakistani military officers,” and erroneous map information provided by NATO to Pakistani authorities, were to blame for the battlefield blunder, which has added enormous strain to the already fraught relationship between Washington and Islamabad. Read full article > >

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U.S.: Poor coordination, mapping data led to Pakistani deaths in cross-border raid