Taliban | featured news

The accusation by U.S. Attorney General Eric Holder should increase pressure on the Pakistan military to attack the Taliban in the lawless region of North Waziristan.

KANDAHAR (Reuters) - The signature weapon of the Iraq war has established itself as the Taliban's weapon of choice in Afghanistan as well, where roadside bombs have proven to be rudimentary and cheap -- but deadly as ever.

Iran is helping train Taliban fighters within its borders, according to U.S. military and intelligence officials.

Afghanistan's government denied a report on Tuesday that it had been holding secret peace talks with the Taliban's number two leader, Mullah Abdul Ghani Baradar, when he was arrested in Pakistan.

Suicide bombers targeting the Pakistani military killed at least 45 people in Lahore on Friday, officials said, in a challenge to government assertions that crackdowns have weakened Taliban insurgents.

Secretary of Defense Robert Gates told troops in southern Afghanistan on Tuesday they would soon be part of a "decisive phase" in the war -- an operation to impose control over the Taliban heartland of Kandahar province.

U.S. Marines and Afghan soldiers advanced through poppy fields of Marjah on Saturday under withering gunfire from Taliban fighters shooting from mudbrick homes and compounds where families huddled in terror.

A son of the leader of a major Taliban faction attacking Western forces in Afghanistan has been killed in a missile strike by a U.S. drone in Pakistan, security officials said on Friday.

The Taliban’s familiar display of haphazard and ineffective shooting has been punctuated by the work of what would seem to be several well-trained marksmen.

Mullah Abdul Ghani Baradar captured in Pakistan in secret raid by U.S., Pakistani intelligence forces.