Jason Motlagh recounts how he first teamed up with the Pulitzer Center, which kick-started his career as an independent journalist reporting in war zones in India and Afghanistan.
CJR's assistant editor Joel Meares interviews Pulitzer Center grantee Nir Rosen about the WikiLeaks war logs dump. Rosen has reported from Afghanistan over the past year on the limits of the US counterinsurgency strategy.
In a three-day diary, Jason Motlagh examines how the Taliban is evolving to overcome the U.S. army's counter-insurgency tactics.
Afghani soldiers try to take control of public security in Kandahar and convince locals of the government's legitimacy over insurgents and criminals.
Was the Taliban behind the actions of a rogue Afghan army soldier who allegedly shot dead three British servicemen overnight while they slept?
The Dand district center is a novelty in the badlands of Kandahar province. As the seat of both the top government official and U.S. forces based in the area, it's a seductive target for Taliban militants looking to make a statement.
When are U.S. forces in Afghanistan allowed to shoot back when they come under attack? An episode last month illustrates the quandary American troops face.
It's another hot day on the boardwalk. The long line of customers who are waiting for iced cappuccinos, many in shorts and sunglasses, runs out the café door and around the corner, a stone's throw from the outdoor hockey rink and volleyball courts.
Marine Sergeant Landon McLilly squinted into his rifle scope at a group of suspected Taliban militants in the hazy near distance.
The commander of international forces in Afghanistan was scheduled to pay a surprise visit to Marines at Combat Outpost Hanson in Marjah this week, some four months after they waged a fierce offensive to break the Taliban's grip. Instead, General Stanley McChrystal headed back to Washington, his job in jeopardy over published remarks that criticize President Obama and senior staff members for hamstringing efforts to turn around the nine-year war.
Afghan President Hamid Karzai's peace jirga earlier this month was pretty close to a bust. Powerful northern rivals were conspicuously absent, as were the Taliban, who instead dispatched a pair of suicide bombers to disturb the proceedings, detonating not far from where the conference took place. The violence, however, overshadowed a rare moment of unity among influential lawmakers and elders: a full-throated call to release of hundreds of prisoners, possibly even including Taliban, languishing in Afghan and U.S. military jails.
Fifteen months ago, coalition and Afghan forces traveling the road that slices through this rugged mountain valley, less than an hour's drive from the capital Kabul, were attacked so frequently by Taliban gunmen it was nicknamed the "Valley of Death" — one of the country's many. Today, school children walk home on the pavement and apple farmers tend their orchards without fear of firefights.
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