Insurgency — Chris Sands: War Studies Scholar

A grave for a Kashmiri militant killed fighting for the Taliban regime. The tombstone explains that his name was Mohammed Suleiman Kashmiri and he was a member of Harakat ul-Ansar. He "received the position of martyrdom in Sheikh Ali, February 24, 1997." The tombstone is broken in half, probably as a result of vandalism by Northern Alliance fighters after the 2001 US-led invasion.

Kabul, August 2012.

Highway One, the main road from Kabul to Kandahar. July 2009.

A photograph of a Taliban suspect found during a house raid by British, Dutch and Afghan troops in the Balochi Valley, Uruzgan province.

November 2007.

Lt. William Godwin of A Company, 1st Battalion, Royal Gurkha Rifles, (right) leads the interrogation of a suspected Taliban insurgent in the Balochi Valley, Uruzgan province.

November 2007.

Five people died in this rocket attack near the governor's office in central Kabul on December 15, 2007.

Afghan soldiers search a house in the Balochi Valley, Uruzgan province.

November 2007.

The scene soon after a suicide bomber struck a bus carrying police recruits in central Kabul. At least 35 people were killed and 52 wounded.

June 18, 2007.

The Old City area of Faizabad, Badakhshan province, during development work aimed at improving the local economy. Much of the Old City was being demolished to make way for a new road designed to recreate the historic Silk Route and improve trade with neighbouring China.

April 2013.

Graffiti in the ruins of the Russian Cultural Centre, Kabul.

November 2010.

The aftermath of a suicide attack on the Bakhtar guest house in Shahr-e-Naw, Kabul. Five UN employees were among the dead.

November 2009.

Mohammed Jawad claims to have been just 12 years old when he was sent to Guantanamo Bay for alleged involvement in a grenade attack that injured two US soldiers and their interpreter in 2002. He was released in 2009 after seven years in American custody.

Kabul, September 2009.

Engineer Ahmad Shah Ahmadzai, prime minister in the mujahideen government of the mid-1990s. Kabul, May 2013.

Mawlawi Pir Mohammed Rohani, rector of Kabul University under the first Taliban government and a member of the High Peace Council during the Karzai administration. October 2012.

Saydabad district, Maidan Wardak province. July 2009.

A monument to Johnny Mike Spann, the first American killed in the war. Spann was a CIA operations officer who died during an uprising by Taliban prisoners on November 25, 2001, at the Qala-e-Jangi fortress (pictured here) on Mazar-e Sharif's outskirts.

May 2009.

Afghan troops on the Khost to Gardez highway. August, 2011.

Khalid Mahmoud, 25, from Punjab in Pakistan. An inmate of Pul-e Charkhi prison, Kabul, he was detained after being accused of plotting to carry out a suicide attack in southern Afghanistan. Mahmoud claimed he was framed by the border police in Kandahar.

Kabul, March 2011.

Shinkay district, Zabul province. March 2010.

Captain Rick Mina of Second Platoon, Delta Company, Second Battalion, 87th Infantry Regiment, 10th Mountain Division, during a firefight in Salar, Saydabad district, Maidan Wardak province.

July 2009.

A page from the scrapbook of Tony Gibb, who served in the North West Frontier Corps South Waziristan Scouts until partition in 1947.

Salisbury, UK. October 2010.

Nazanin, 10, is from Sar-e-Pul in northern Afghanistan. After her father died and her mother remarried her grandparents refused to let her live with her mother and stepfather. Held by them against her will, Nazanin was regularly raped by her uncle over the course of a year, and repeatedly beaten and burnt by her grandfather. She was eventually returned to her mother, Zulaikha (pictured with her) and stepfather around twenty days before this photo was taken.

Sheberghan, April 2011.

Gulbuddin, the stepfather of Nazanin. Sheberghan, April 2011.

Sher Mohammed Akhundzada, a former governor of Helmand province and a key figure in the Afghan drugs trade.

Kabul, July 2009.

The aftermath of a suicide attack on the Bakhtar guest house in Shahr-e-Naw, Kabul. At least five UN employees were killed in the attack.

November 2009.

Eidi Mohammed holds photographs of his brother Nazer Mohammed, whose remains were unearthed in a mass grave on the outskirts of Faizabad, Badakhshan province. Nazer and the other victims were killed by the former communist regime of Noor Mohammed Taraki and Hafizullah Amin.

July 2009.

Just one of the possessions left behind in the aftermath of a suicide attack on the Bakhtar guest house in Shahr-e-Naw, Kabul. Five UN employees were among the dead.

November 2009.

Some of the damage caused by a suicide attack on the Bakhtar guest house in Shahr-e-Naw, Kabul.

November 2009.

Zirgay's 12-year-old brother, Zabi, was killed on Jalalabad Road, the main highway running east out of Kabul According to witnesses, he died when a foreign military convoy deliberately rammed a mini-bus off the road and into his butcher's shop in November 2008. Shots were also said to have been fired and protests erupted afterwards. January 2009.

Mawlawi Abdul Hadid ( wearing the white turban) in Kandahar ten months after an air strike on his home district of Panjwayi killed 30 civilians, according to local residents. "If a soldier tells me has brought security, I will tell him he has brought me death every day," he said.

March 2007.

Photos of Shir Jan Muzhdaria, a parliamentary candidate in the 2010 elections and a former interior minister in the communist government of Noor Mohammed Taraki.

Kabul, November 2010.

Soldiers from A Company, 1st Battalion, Royal Gurkha Rifles, look out over the Balochi Valley, Uruzgan province.

November 2007.

Kunduz city, March 2009.

Ashraf Ghani during his unsuccessful election campaign for the presidency in 2009. Ghani was eventually elected as president of Afghanistan in 2014.

Gardez, Paktia province. August 2009.

Graffiti in the ruins of the Russian Cultural Centre, Kabul. The word next to the helicopter is 'Allah'.

July 2012.

A security checkpoint outside Pul-e-Charkhi prison, Kabul. March 2011.

An abandoned Taliban fighting position is destroyed in a controlled explosion during a sweep of the Balochi Valley, Uruzgan province, by British, Dutch and Afghan forces.

November 2007.

Haji Mohammed Niam Kuchi, a deputy minister in the first Taliban government, was detained by US forces as he travelled from his home province of Logar to Kabul in 2003. He was subsequently sent to Guantanamo Bay, before being released in 2004 without charge.

Kabul, January 2009.

Khairullah, an Afghan soldier stationed at Camp Grizzly, Shinkay district, Zabul province.

March 2010.

A snooker table lying in the ruins of the Bakhtar guest house in Shahr-e-Naw, Kabul, following a Taliban attack. Five UN employees staying at the guest house were among the dead.

November 2009.

General Abdul Rashid Dostum, one of Afghanistan most notorious warlords, during a ceremony to mark Ashura.

Kabul, December 2009.

The scene soon after a suicide bombing outside the NATO military headquarters in Kabul. At least seven people were killed. August 15, 2009.

The grave of Ajmal Naqshbandi, an Afghan fixer for foreign journalists who was beheaded by the Taliban in Helmand province in April 2007.

Kabul, January 2011.

A member of Second Platoon, Delta Company, Second Battalion, 87th Infantry Regiment, 10th Mountain Division on patrol in Saydabad district, Maidan Wardak province.

July 2009.

Graffiti in the ruins of the Russian Cultural Centre, Kabul. July 2012.

Mohammed Hussein Sangadost, a former MP for Maidan Wardak province and a former mujahideen commander allied to the first Taliban government. July 2011.

A billboard showing Afghan president Hamid Karzai and his half brother, Ahmed Wali Karzai. Earlier that month Wali Karzai was assassinated in Kandahar. He had links to both the CIA and the international drugs trade.

Kabul, July 2011.

The morning after a suicide attack on the Indian embassy in Kabul killed at least 58 people. July 2008.

A poster encouraging women to vote in the 2009 presidential election.

Kabul, August 2009.

Women voting in the August 20, 2009 presidential election. Kart-e Char, Kabul.

2LT Russell G. Tabolt of Anarchy Troop, 6-4 Cav, 1st Platoon, 3rd Brigade, 1st Infantry Division on patrol along the Khost to Gardez highway.

August 2011.

Some of the remains found in a mass grave newly uncovered from the communist era.

Badakhshan province, April 2007.

Abdul Wahid Tarqat, an operative for KHAD, the Afghan intelligence service of the former communist regime.

Kabul, November 2010.

Mohammed Mohaqiq (second from left) and General Abdul Rashid Dostum (centre), two of Afghanistan's most powerful warlords, during a ceremony to mark Ashura.

Kabul, December 2010.

A screen shot of Afghan President Hamid Karzai as news breaks that Benazir Bhutto, the former prime minister of Pakistan, has been assassinated.

Kabul, December 27, 2007.

The tomb of former king Zahir Shah and his father Nader Shah. January 2011.

This UN compound in Mazar-e Sharif was stormed by protestors weeks earlier, resulting in the deaths of three UN staff and four Nepalese guards. The protestors had gathered to demonstrate against the public burning of a Qur'an in America by pastor Terry Jones.

April 2011.

Bismillah, an Afghan soldier station at Camp Grizzly, Shinkay district, Zabul province. March 2010.

Hanifa's brother-in-law forced her to marry a 20 year-old relative when she was aged just eight. Only after other family members protested the marriage was she granted a a divorce.

Sheberghan, September 2008.

The road from Baghlan to Kunduz. March 2009.

Shafiq Shah, a prisoner in Pul-e-Charkhi jail, Kabul. From Balochistan in Pakistan, Shah was working in a bakery when a Taliban commander recruited him to carry out a suicide attack in Kandahar. The attack failed when he crashed his car full of explosives into a wall while searching for foreign soldiers to kill.

Kabul, April 2009.

A campaign poster for Abdullah Abdullah, candidate in the 2009 presidential election. He is pictured with the former king Zahir Shah (left), a man he once bitterly opposed. Kabul, August 2009.

The view from COP Carwile, Saydabad district, Maidan Wardak province. July 2009.

Chilsitoon, Kabul. December 2010.

In July 2008 a US air strike on a wedding party in Nangarhar province killed 47 civilians, turning local people who had once opposed the Taliban into ardent critics of the occupation. Atiqullah, 16, was the groom that day. Among the dead were his wife, three brothers, two sisters and one of his father's wives.

Jalalabad, December 2009.

PFC Tyler Czech of the 3rd Brigade, 1st Infantry Division, Anarchy Troop, 6-4 Cav, 1st Platoon, guards an insurgent fighting position overlooking the main road from Khost to Gardez, eastern Afghanistan.

August 2011.

Some of the remains found in a mass grave newly uncovered from the communist era. Badakhshan province, April 2007.

Jalalabad, December 2009.

Aziz Azizi checks the house of his relatives after it was raided by Afghan and foreign troops. Among those killed were a 24-year-old man, the man's wife and their two sons, aged around one and two.

Kabul, September 2008.

Ghulam Haider Naqshbandi at home a year after his son, Ajmal Naqshbandi, a fixer for foreign journalists, was beheaded by the Taliban.

Kabul, April 2008.

A US contractor guards the scene of a suicide attack on a bus carrying police recruits in central Kabul. At least 35 people were killed and 52 wounded. June 18, 2007.

Qari Naqibullah. While he and his brother were visiting a friend detained by US troops at Bagram air base, his brother - a 33-year-old farmer named Hamidullah - was also detained. The Americans provided no explanation for his detention.

Kabul, March 2013.

Haji Habiburrahman Haqqani. An elder from Baghlan province, he was lobbying for the release of a young farmer, Hamidullah, detained by US forces at Bagram air base without explanation.

Kabul, March 2013.

New recruits at Kabul Military Training Centre, February 2010.

A drug addict in the ruins of the Russian Cultural Centre, Kabul. February 2009.

Sheberghan, July 2007.

Crimes against women in northern Afghanistan have increased alarmingly since the fall of the Taliban regime. At the age of 13 Samiya was abducted in Sar-e-Pul province. Over the course of a week her kidnappers raped her eight times.

Sheberghan, September 2008.

The former Afghan president Mohammed Daoud Khan is reburied 31 years after he was overthrown in a communist coup. Kabul, March 2009.

Children recite the Qur'an at the Markazi Paktia Kot Mosque soon after the imam was shot and killed by foreign troops while travelling to teach students elsewhere in the city.

Kabul, February 2010.

Mohammed Ayas, a resident of Chilsitoon in Kabul. One of his sons, Mohammed Abas, was killed fighting the Soviets. Another of his sons, Arsalan, died during fighting between the Taliban and the Northern Alliance. December 2010.

A protest organised by the Islamist civil society group, Jamiat-e Eslah, after ten civilians, including eight students, were reported to have been killed by US forces in Kunar province.

Kabul. December 2009.

A soldier from A Company, 1st Battalion, Royal Gurkha Rifles and a colleague from the Afghan army on patrol in the Balochi Valley, Uruzgan province.

November 2007.

A cloud of smoke rises up over the city seconds after a suicide car bomber targeted a hotel in Wazir Akbar Khan, Kabul. December 15, 2009.

A poster urging resistance to the US-led occupation in response to a Danish cartoon depicting the Prophet Mohammed. “Jews and Christians and their dirty leaders have shown their obvious enmity towards Islam, the Prophet Mohammed, the Qur’an and the Muslims of the world several times. The Islamic world and Muslim leaders and presidents are their slaves, watching them disrespect holy Islamic principles,” the poster says.

Kabul, April 2008.

Dutch troops, Uruzgan province. October 2007.

Rahima, 16, died after setting herself on fire in Herat. Cases of self-immolation among girls and women have risen sharply in the province since the 2001 US-led invasion. The phenomenon remains largely unexplained.

Herat, January 2010.

Kunduz, March 2009.

A Sikh temple in Kabul bearing the scars of the 1992-1996 civil war. February 2009.

A flare is fired by US forces during a firefight between members of Second Platoon, Delta Company, Second Battalion, 87th Infantry Regiment, 10th Mountain Division and insurgents in Salar, Saydabad district, Maidan Wardak province.

July 2009.

A bodyguard accompanying Ashraf Ghani, presidential candidate, during a campaign visit to Gardez, Paktia province. August 2009.

For several months Meena, aged around 12, and her family had been harassed by a local warlord to whom they owed money. In lieu of payment the warlord demanded that Meena marry his son. Her family rejected the warlord's overtures and finally raised the money, saying Meena was too young for marriage and wanted to finish school. Meena, however, continued to be harassed.

Balkh city, September 2008.

Soliha's 11-year-old sister, Sweeta, was taken to a military base in Shebergan, the capital of Jowzjan province and raped by a commander in the Afghan army. Crimes against women in northern Afghanistan have increased alarmingly since the fall of the Taliban regime.

Sheberghan, September 2008.

Children recite the Qur'an at the Markazi Paktia Kot Mosque soon after the imam there was shot and killed by foreign troops while travelling to teach students elsewhere in the city.

Kabul, February 2010.

Dutch troops, Uruzgan province. October 2007.

Uruzgan province, October 2007.

Shirin Gul lies in hospital in Herat with burns over 30 percent of her body. Aged 16 and already a wife and mother, she claimed the injuries were sustained as a result of a gas explosion. A doctor at the hospital said she had in fact deliberately set herself on fire - just one of many cases of self-immolation among women and girls in the province.

January 2010.

Narullah Mansoor (left), a local elder, at the Markazi Paktia Kot Mosque after the imam there was shot and killed by foreign troops while travelling in a car to teach students elsewhere in the city. The imam's son, Mohammed Wazir (centre) was with his father at the time of the incident.

Kabul, February 2010.

New recruits at Kabul Military Training Centre, February 2010.

Omar Zai village, Shinkay district, Zabul province, during a patrol by troops from Alpha Battery, 2nd Platoon of the 82nd Airborne, 4th Brigade, 1-508 Parachute Infantry Regiment. Hamid Agha, a local Taliban leader, was believed to be from the village.

March 2010.

A grave for an Afghan killed fighting for the Taliban regime prior to the US occupation. The headstone explains that buried here is Qari Abdul Tawab, a Talib from Badakhshan in northern Afghanistan. He was killed in the Islamic year 1418 (1998), at the age of 21, in the area of Hussein Kot, Barikaw, north of Kabul. "He received a very high level of martyrdom."

Kabul, August 2012.

A poster commemorating Burhanuddin Rabbani, president during the 1992-1996 Mujahideen government. Rabbani was killed by a suicide bomber on September 20, 2011. The poster was displayed on a wall in Wazir Akbar Khan, Kabul.

September 2012.

Rushing to the scene of a February 26, 2010, suicide attack by Lashkar-e-Taiba. Shahr-e Naw, Kabul.The attack targeted two guest houses popular with Indian workers. Dozens of people were killed or injured.

A poster for the 2005 parliamentary election campaign of Abdul Rabb al-Rasul Sayyaf, one of the country's most notorious warlords.

Kabul, March 2009.

The collapse of the Taliban regime did not end the suffering of women in northern Afghanistan. For many, the subsequent breakdown in law and order has proved catastrophic. Najiba's first husband was a member of a local militia when he was killed in the 1990s. Her second husband keeps disappearing for long periods at a time and she doesn't know what he's up to while he's gone. She has tried to give her children to an orphanage but does not want a divorce.

Sheberghan, June 2009.

Mohammed Ismail Qasemyar, a member of the High Peace Council.

Kabul, January 2012.

Haji Ramazan, a prominent member of Afghanistan's Hazara community, at a ceremony to commemorate Ashura. Seven-and-a-half years later he was killed in a suicide attack at the same mosque.

December 2009.

Kabul Military Training Centre, February 2010.

A protest organised by the Islamist civil society group, Jamiat-e Eslah, after ten civilians, including eight students, were reported to have been killed by US forces in Kunar province.

Kabul. December 2009.

Saydabad district, Maidan Wardak province. July 2009.

Soon after a February 26, 2010, suicide attack by Lashkar-e-Taiba. Shahr-e Naw, Kabul. The attack targeted two guest houses popular with Indian workers. Dozens of people were killed or injured.

Graffiti in the ruins of the Russian Cultural Centre, Kabul. The graffiti refers to a April 27, 2008 assassination attempt on President Hamid Karzai during a military parade in the city. "Karzai not only escaped but shat his trousers," it says.

July 2012.

Afghan President Hamid Karzai during a press conference at the presidential palace. Kabul, April 2009.

A soldier from Second Platoon, Delta Company, of the Second Battalion, 87th Infantry Regiment, 10th Mountain Division on patrol in Salar, Saydabad district, Maidan Wardak province.

July 2009.

Shebil village, Shinkay district, Zabul province, during a patrol by Afghan forces and soldiers from Alpha Battery, 2nd Platon, 82nd Airborne, 4th Brigade, 1-508 Parachute Infantry Regiment.

March 2010.

Ahmad Shah Massoud. Bagram, April 2009.

Viagra for sale in a shop outside Bagram, the largest US base in Afghanistan. April 2009.

Sahira Sharif, MP for Khost province. September 2010.

PFC Larry Smith of Alpha Battery, 2nd Platoon, 82nd Airborne, 4th Brigade, 1-508 Parachute Infantry Regiment. On patrol in Suri bazaar, Shinkay district, Zabul province.

March 2010.

Abed, a 22-year-old from Pakistan, spent months training with the Taliban in Waziristan before crossing into Afghanistan to carry out a suicide bombing. Driving a truck packed full of explosives towards his target, he halted the attack at the last minute when he realised the Taliban had sent him to kill Afghan troops rather than foreign soldiers. Imprisoned in Pul-e-Charkhi jail, Kabul, he had no idea when his sentence was due to end.

April 2009.

Abed, a Pakistani, spent months training with the Taliban in Waziristan before crossing into Afghanistan to carry out a suicide bombing. Driving a truck packed full of explosives towards his target, he halted the attack at the last minute when he realised the Taliban had sent him to kill Afghan troops rather than foreign soldiers. Imprisoned in Pul-e-Charkhi jail, Kabul, he had no idea when his sentence was due to end. First photographed in April 2009, he was no longer happy to show his face - fearing reprisals from the Taliban and Al-Qaeda.

March 2011.

A book by US rightwing TV host Glenn Beck used for target practice by a member of Alpha Battery, Second Platoon, 82nd Airborne, 4th Brigade, 1-508 Parachute Infantry Regiment. FOB Wolverine, Shinkay district, Zabul province.

March 2010.

Members of Alpha Battery, 2nd Platoon, 82nd Airborne, 4th Brigade, 1-508 Infantry Regiment go in search of a non-existent village in Shinkay district, Zabul province, after receiving false reports that 25 Taliban were meeting there.

April 2010.

Crimes against women in northern Afghanistan have increased alarmingly since the fall of the Taliban regime. Taj Niazi (left) was 12 when she married a man in his forties. Aged 20 at the time of this photograph, she had been trying to divorce him for the last five years. She is pictured with her mother, Rahima.

June 2009.

Mawlawi Sharifullah Sadiqi, a 2010 parliamentary candidate for Jowzjan province and an Islamic studies teacher at a girls' high school. April 2011.

Abdul Jabar Sabet, attorney general in the Karzai government and former Hizb-e Islami member.

Kabul, May 2013.

Kaka Tajuddin, father-in-law of Ahmad Shah Massoud, at his house in Bazarak, Panjshir province. May 2009.

Omar Zai, Shinkay district, Zabul province. March 2010.

In November 2001 Taliban prisoners at Qala-e- Jangi fortress, on the outskirts of Mazar-e- Sharif, staged an uprising against their captors from the Northern Alliance and the CIA. John Walker Lindh, a young American who had joined the Taliban prior to 9/11, was among those who took refuge in this basement as US planes bombed the fort.

May 2009.

Afghan soldiers search a house in Jugyan, Shinkay district, Zabul province, minutes after an American paratrooper was shot and injured there by a sniper.

March 2010.

Troops from Alpha Battery, 2nd Platoon, 82nd Airborne, 4th Brigade, 1-508 Parachute Infantry Regiment return to Camp Wolverine in Shinkay district, Zabul province.

March 2010.

Kunduz, the home province of Gulbuddin Hekmatyar. March 2009.

A girl's school in Panjshir province, May 2009.

A paratrooper from 82nd Airborne in Sur Kani, Shinkay district, Zabul province. The patch on the helmet reads: 'Terrorist Hunting Permit. No Bag Limit. Tagging Not Required.'

March 2010.

Haji Allahdad (left) had not even heard of Guantanamo Bay when his son, Abdullah Hekmat (not pictured), was arrested by local militiamen in the northern city of Mazar-e-Sharif and handed over to American forces soon after the US-led invasion. Hekmat's family assumed he had been killed until he wrote to them from the detention centre, via the Red Cross. He spent seven years in Guantanamo before finally being freed.

Mazar-e Sharif, May 2009.

Juma Gul (left) wiped away tears with her burqa and slumped forward with her head in her hands as she described how she sold her daughter, Zulaikha, off for marriage. The girl's fiancé had memorised the Qur'an and his father promised that her virginity would be respected until she was an adult. The couple eventually wed when she was eight and he was in his 20s. Her husband raped her during the nights and forced her into making carpets during the day. Zulaikha has since suffered from psychiatric problems.

Sheberghan, June 2009.

The grave of Ustad Farid, a former Hizb-e Islami commander and Afghan senator, who was assassinated in Kabul on May 2, 2007. He is buried in his home province of Kapisa.

Kohistan, Kapisa, April 2012.

Ishaq Nizami, head of radio and television during the first Taliban government. Kabul, April 2010.

The road from Khash to Faizabad, Badakhshan province. April 2007.

Ghrana, 13, lost her right leg and much of her left arm as a result of an air strike in Helmand in 2009. Her uncle, Ahmed Abed, said, "The Americans know who is a Talib and who is innocent but they don't care."

Kabul, May 2009.

Nangyalay Sidiqi, an Afghan soldier station at Camp Grizzly, Shinkay district, Zabul province. March 2010.

Afghans displaced by insecurity in southern Afghanistan show pictures of children they claim were killed in the fighting.

Kabul, May 2009.

Mohammed Halim Fedai, governor of Maidan Wardak province. Maidan Shahr, May 2010.

Safiullah, 30, from Karachi in Pakistan. Recruited as a suicide bomber by the Taliban, he was arrested in the western province of Herat while planning to attack a convoy of foreign troops. After three years in jail in Herat he was transferred to Pul-e Charkhi prison, Kabul.

Kabul, March 2011.

A US soldier from the the 10th Mountain Division examines a badly damaged Mine-Resistant Ambush Protected vehicle (MRAP) at FOB Airborne, Maidan Wardak province. The vehicle was hit by a roadside bomb.

June 2009.

Graffiti in the ruins of the Russian Cultural Centre, Kabul. July 2012.

Haji Ghulam Mohammed Hotak, militia commander for the Afghan Public Protection Force in Maidan Wardak province.

Kabul, May 2010.

Zalmay, a member of the Afghan army, at the Late Sardar Mohammed Daoud Khan Military Hospital in Kabul. He lost both his legs and much of his left hand when a bomb exploded as he was searching a house in Helmand province.

June 2009.

Abdul Zaher Dayee, professor in Islamic law at Kabul University.

Kabul, August 2012.

Soldiers from Second Platoon, Delta Company, of the Second Battalion, 87th Infantry Regiment, 10th Mountain Division on patrol along the Kabul-Kandahar highway.

Saydabad district, Maidan Wardak province. July 2009.

Haji Arbab Faramoos, a local elder. Pul-e-Khumri, Baghlan province. June 2010.

Aref Ullah, 19, was arrested by Afghan forces and accused of being an insurgent while trying to collect a prosthetic arm for himself from the Red Cross in Kabul. He denied any involvement with the insurgency.

Pul-e-Charkhi, Kabul. March 2011.

Mohammed Sharaf, an unemployed father-of-nine, whose house had been demolished to make way for a new road running through Panjshir province, north of Kabul. He received no financial compensation from the government.

Paryan district, Panjshir. August 2010.

Mohammed Sharaf, an unemployed father-of-nine, whose house had been demolished to make way for a new road running through Panjshir province, north of Kabul. He received no financial compensation from the government.

Paryan district, Panjshir. August 2010.

Soldiers from Second Platoon, Delta Company, of the Second Battalion, 87th Infantry Regiment, 10th Mountain Division, wait for a controlled explosion of ammonium nitrate fertiliser discovered during a patrol in Saydabad district, Maidan Wardak province.

July 2009.

Akbar Agha, a former Taliban commander, at his home in Khoshal Khan, Kabul, soon after he was pardoned by President Hamid Karzai for his role in the kidnapping of three UN workers in 2004.

September 2010.

Afghan security forces patrol the streets of Koti Sangi, Kabul, following clashes between ethnic Hazaras and police. The clashes erupted as a result of growing tensions between the Hazaras and Pashtun nomads.

August 2010.

Saydabad district, Maidan Wardak province. July 2009.

Baghlan province, April 2011.

Khair Uddin, Afghan soldier stationed at Camp Grizzly, Shinkay district, Zabul province. March 2010.

Abdul Basir, also known as Dr. Anwar. Hizb-e Islami member and minister of justice in the government of Ashraf Ghani.

Kabul, June 2013.

Malik Ayoub Khan, a tribal elder from the Khyber agency in Pakistan. December 2010.

Malalai Joya, a civil society activist and former MP. Kabul, August 2010.

Mullah Abdul Salam Rocketi, a former Taliban commander, and his son, Mirwais, at home in Khoshal Khan, Kabul. January 2011.

Haji Mohammed Musa Hotak, deputy minister of planning in the first Taliban government. Kabul, April 2010.

A grave for an Afghan killed fighting for the Taliban regime prior to the US occupation. The headstone explains that the deceased was name Mullah Gul Ahmad. He was a resident of Badakhshan province in northern Afghanistan, and died at the age of 22. The headstone was probably broken in an act of vandalism by Northern Alliance fighters after the 2001 US-led invasion.

Kabul, August 2012.

Fazel Khan, an Afghan soldier stationed at Camp Grizzly, Shinkay district, Zabul province. March 2010.

Ashaq Ullah, 21, an inmate in Pul-e Charkhi prison, Kabul. He was jailed for involvement in a plot to kill the governor of Nangarhar province - a charge he denied.

April 2009.

Mohammed Daoud Razmak, a member of the Afghanistan Solidarity Party. Kabul, May 2010.

Family photos on display in a house searched by US troops in Saydabad district, Maidan Wardak province. Nothing suspicious was found in the home.

July 2009.

Debris left over the day after an attack on the British Council in Kabul killed at least 12 people. August 2011.

Abdullah, an Afghan soldier station at Camp Grizzly, Shinkay district, Zabul province. March 2010.

Graffiti in the ruins of the Russian Cultural Centre, Kabul. September 2011.

Malalai Joya, civil society activist and former MP for Farah province. July 2011.

The Blue Mosque, Mazar-e Sharif. April 2011

A boy waits as US and Afghan soldiers search a house in Jugyan, Shinkay district, Zabul province, minutes after an American paratrooper was shot and injured by an insurgent sniper.

March 2010.

Troops from Alpha Battery, 2nd Platoon, 82nd Airborne, 4th Brigade, 1-508 Parachute Infantry Regiment search in vain for a Taliban lookout.

Shinkay district, Zabul province. April 2010.

Police block off the main road in Kart-e-Char, Kabul, during a Taliban attack on a nearby guesthouse used by foreign aid workers. The Taliban accused the the aid workers of being Christian missionaries.

March 28, 2014.

A campaign office for Ashraf Ghani during the 2009 presidential election. Kabul, August 2009.

Sayed Abdul Wahid (foreground) at home after two of his daughters were killed in an insurgent rocket attack on his house in Afshar, Kabul. The intended target was probably a nearby police station.

January 2009.

Abdul Hanan Waheed, Hizb-e Islami member.

Kabul, November 2012.

A burnt fuel tanker lies beside the main road leading from Baghlan to Kabul following an ambush by insurgents.

April 2011.

A building destroyed during the 1992-1996 civil war. Jadi Maiwand, Kabul. September 2011.

2LT Russell G. Tabolt of Anarchy Troop, 6-4 Cav, 1st Platoon, 3rd Brigade, 1st Infantry Division on patrol along the Khost to Gardez highway.

August 2011.

Abdul Hakim, Afghan soldier stationed at Camp Grizzly, Shinkay district, Zabul province. March 2010.

Khalid, aged around 20 and from Khost. A madrassa student, he was caught carrying explosives in eastern Afghanistan. Khalid claimed he had been persuaded to carry the explosives by a cousin, who told him the container in which they were hidden was full of cooking oil. He denied any involvement with the insurgency.

Pul-e Charkhi prison, Kabul. March 2011.

Begging on the road to the Bagram air base, the biggest US base in Afghanistan. Parwan province, January 2009.

Kabul Military Training Centre, February 2010.

New recruits at Kabul Military Training Centre, February 2010.

The view from Combat Outpost Carwile in Sayed Abad district, Maidan Wardak province, during a rocket attack by insurgents.

July 2009.

The graffiti reads 'Death to the Taliban'.

Pul-e-Sorkh, Kabul. December 2011.

A Soviet-era mural in the ruins of the Russian Cultural Centre, Kabul. November 2010.

Onlookers gather the morning after an attack by the Taliban on a guest house in Kart-e-Se, Kabul. The insurgents accused the foreigners of being Christian missionaries - a claim supported by local residents.

March 2014.

A grave for a Pakistani militant killed fighting for the Taliban regime. The headstone explains his name was Abdul Majid and he was a member of Harakat ul-Ansar. He died on September 12, 1998. The headstone, and many others like it in the cemetery, was probably smashed by Northern Alliance fighters after the 2001 US-led invasion.

August 2012.

A refugee camp for Afghans displaced by fighting in Helmand and Kandahar. Charayee Qambar, Kabul. January 2012.

Soldiers from Second Platoon, Delta Company, Second Battalion, 87th Infantry Regiment, 10th Mountain Division on patrol along the Kabul-Kandahar highway.

Saydabad district, Maidan Wardak province. July 2009.

Pachha Khan Zadran, a former MP for Paktia province and warlord who clashed with US forces in the early months of the occupation.

Kabul, January 2011.

Posters and food rations at a school in Bamiyan province. August 2008.

Saydabad district, Maidan Wardak province. July 2009.

Salang, April 2011.

Abdullah Kamawal. editor of Shahadat newspaper. November 2010.

A house in Kart-e-Char, Kabul, destroyed during the 1992-1996 civil war. The graffiti on the wall reads 'American Fuck U'.

February 2011.

Much of the Old City area in Faizabad, Badakhshan province, was being demolished to make way for a new road designed to recreate the historic Silk Route and improve trade with neighbouring China.

April 2013.

Ahmad Ullah had been sentenced to seven years in jail after being arrested by Afghan forces during a raid on a mosque in Kabul. Held in Pul-e-Charkhi prison, he denied any role in the insurgency.

March 2011.

A shopping centre in central Kabul three days after it was attacked as part of a co-ordinated assault carried out by Taliban gunmen and suicide bombers across the city.

January 2010.

A traffic police post lies in ruins after being set on fire during clashes between armed supporters of Ahmad Shah Massoud and ethnic Hazaras.

Pul-e-Sorkhta, Kabul. September 2012.

Qazi Sadullah Abu Aman, head of Badakhshan High Peace Council. Faizabad, April 2013.

A placard protesting the killing of Syrian civilians by government forces there. The placard was for use in a demonstration organised by the Afghan Islamist civil society group, Jamiat-e Eslah.

Kabul, September 2012.

A Shia shrine in Kabul three weeks after a suicide bomber struck there, killing at least 54 people. January 2012.

Faizabad, Badakhshan province. April 2013.

Abdul Rahman, a local elder, stands outside a madrassa in Kabul after it was raided at night by foreign troops. He claimed they searched the premises using dog - an insult to Afghan and Islamic custom.

August 2010.

Hilla Achekzai, senator for Uruzgan province. December 2010.

Omar Zai village, Shinkay district, Zabul province. March 2010

Mazar-e Sharif, April 2011.

Commander Azizullah Arghandewal. Detained in Pul-e Charkhi jail, Kabul, he was accused of organising a July 2008 suicide attack on the Indian Embassy, which killed at least 58 people. "What's my crime?" he said. "All the crimes are with those soldiers who came here and made me a criminal."

March 2011.

The evening after a roadside bomb targeted the warlord and MP Mohammed Mohaqiq. Three people were killed and more than 20 injured in the attack but Mohaqiq escaped unhurt. June 18, 2013.

PFC Stefan Amos (right) of Anarchy Troop, 6-4 Cav, 1st Platoon, 3rd Brigade, 1st Infantry Division, tries to collect biometric data from an Afghan on the main road from Khost to Gardez.

August 2011.

Abdul Jabar Sabet, presidential candidate, campaigning in the 2009 election. Faizabad, Badakhshan province. July 2009.

A grave for a Kashmiri militant killed fighting on behalf of the Taliban regime prior to the American occupation. The tombstone explains that his name was Shir Khan Kashmiri. He was killed in Pul-e-Khumri on June 7, 1997. This tombstone, and others like it in the cemetery, was probably smashed by Northern Alliance fighters after the 2001 US-led invasion.

Kabul, August 2012.

A polling station during the 2009 presidential election. Kabul, August 2009.

Ahmad Shah Massoud's helicopter, Panjshir. August 2010.

The pink building was formerly used as a guest house by Osama bin Laden and Al-Qaeda.

Kart-e Parwan, Kabul. March 2011.

Mawlawi Fazlullah Hanif, a former Taliban commander.

Faizabad, April 2013.

Mohammed Anwar Ishaqzai, former MP for Helmand. August 2010.

Clearing up after a suicide attack by Hizb-e Islami killed at least 15 people, including two US soldiers and four foreign contractors.

Kabul, May 16, 2013.

Chilsitoon, December 2010.

Soldiers from Second Platoon, Delta Company, of the Second Battalion, 87th Infantry Regiment, 10th Mountain Division on patrol in Saydabad district, Maidan Wardak province.

July 2009.

A poster commemorating Arsalan Rahmani, a former official in the Taliban government turned peace negotiator. An unknown gunman assassinated him in Kabul on May 13, 2012.

Kabul, June 2013.

Graffiti in the ruins of the Russian Cultural Centre, Kabul. July 2012.

The graves of Sayed Mustafa Kazimi and five other MPs killed in a bombing in Baghlan on November 6, 2007.

Kabul, June 2011.

A billboard promoting the Local Police, a controversial US-backed initiative to establish pro-government militias across rural Afghanistan.

Kabul, March 2013.

A shepherd herds his flock past members of 3rd Brigade, 1st Infantry Division, Anarchy Troop, 6-4 Cav, 1st Platoon, on the Khost to Gardez highway.

August 2011.

Anti-Hekmatyar graffiti near Kabul University. November, 2017.

The morning after an attack by the Taliban on a guest house in Kart-e-Se, Kabul. The insurgents claimed the foreigners using the guest house were Christian missionaries - an allegation supported by local residents.

March 2014.