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KABUL (Reuters) - Afghan security forces have killed Abu Muhsin al-Masri, a senior al Qaeda leader who was on the Federal Bureau of Investigation’s Most Wanted Terrorists list, Afghanistan’s National Directorate of Security (NDS) said in a tweet late on Saturday. Al-Masri has been charged in the United States with having provided material support and resources to a foreign terrorist organisation, and conspiracy to kill U.S. nationals. Al-Masri, believed to be al Qaeda’s second-in-command, was killed during a special operation in Ghazni province, the NDS said. The FBI declined to comment. The al Qaeda operative, who also went by the...

A mystery plane crashed Monday in Taliban-held territory in Afghanistan’s Ghazni province, south of the capital, Afghan officials said. It was not immediately clear how many people were on board the plane. Ariana Afghan Airlines denied reports that it was one of its passenger jets that had come down. Provincial government spokesman Arif Noori told CBS News’ Ahmad Mukhtar the plane appeared to have been a flight between the southern city of Kandahar and the capital Kabul, about 200 miles to the north. Ghazni province is between those two locations Noori said the body of two pilots was found at...

An ancient tower in the Afghan city of Ghazni has collapsed, raising questions over the government's ability to protect the country's artefacts. Footage uploaded to social media shows a fort in the old city crumbling. The tower was one of dozens already destroyed in the city. Officials blamed heavy rain, but some critics accuse the government of negligence. Ghazni's Islamic and pre-Islamic architecture is widely admired although war has taken its toll. Mohammad Saber Mohmand, a spokesman for the ministry of information and culture, told Tolo News the fort was "vulnerable to rainfall and mostly damaged by rain". "The main...

Taliban chief wants direct talks with US Group committed to regional security and would not pose a danger to other countries KABUL: The leader of the Taliban said Saturday there will be no peace in Afghanistan as long as the foreign “occupation” continues, reiterating the group’s position that the 17-year war can only be brought to an end through direct talks with the United States. In a message released on occasion of the Eid Al Adha holiday, Maulvi Haibatullah Akhunzadah said the group remains committed to “Islamic goals,” the sovereignty of Afghanistan and ending the war. The Taliban have had...

The fall of the base in Ghormach district of volatile Faryab province came with security forces already stretched by the days of fighting in Ghazni Mazar-I-Sharif, Afghanistan: Taliban fighters overran a northern Afghan army base, officials said on Tuesday, killing at least 14 soldiers with dozens feared captured in a stinging blow to security forces already struggling to push insurgents from eastern Ghazni. The fall of the base in Ghormach district of volatile Faryab province came with security forces - who have struggled to hold back the Taliban since NATO combat troops pulled out in 2014 - already stretched by...

A Taliban spokesman said the group targeted a military base and two check posts in Baghlan and seized armoured vehicles and ammunition Kabul: A Taliban attack on a military outpost in Afghanistan’s northern province of Baghlan on Wednesday killed up to 44 Afghan police and soldiers, provincial officials said, as the insurgents kept up pressure on government forces. The attack, which came as the central city of Ghazni struggles to recover from five days of intense fighting, underlined how hard the insurgents have been pressuring badly stretched local security forces. The defence ministry confirmed the incident early on Wednesday, but...

Show availability of Iran for al Qaeda training, plotting. This week, prosecutors in New York introduced eight documents recovered in Osama bin Laden’s compound in Pakistan as evidence in the trial of a terrorism suspect. The U.S. government accuses Abid Naseer of taking part in al Qaeda’s scheme to attack targets in Europe and New York City. The files do not support the view, promoted by some in the Obama administration, that bin Laden was in “comfortable retirement,” “sidelined,” or “a lion in winter” in the months leading up to his death. Some of the key revelations in the newly-released...

Taleban rule the road in Ghazni Alastair Leithead BBC News, Ghazni, central Afghanistan Thunder echoed around the wide valley announcing the arrival of a blinding sandstorm that rushed along the roads and down corridors between tall, impenetrable mud compounds. The hostages could be held in as many as 15 separate villages The dust whipped up around the police - dozens of them, all heavily armed - who accompanied us to the place where the South Korean church volunteers had been kidnapped. They tentatively showed us where they think the 21 survivors are being held. In two weeks, two hostages have...

SEOUL, July 20 (Yonhap) -- About 20 young South Koreans in Afghanistan are feared to have been kidnapped by Taliban insurgents, the Foreign Ministry said Friday. "We obtained an intelligence report that the South Koreans were abducted by Taliban insurgents this morning and are now trying to confirm it through various channels," the ministry said in a statement. "Considering a variety of circumstantial evidence, chances are high that the report is true."

Excerpt - KABUL, Afghanistan (AP) — The Taliban conducted a raid in Afghanistan's volatile south and took control of a provincial district, killing five people including the district chief and the head of the district police, the deputy governor said Friday. The Taliban launched the attack Thursday evening on the Giro district of Ghazni province and during an hours-long clash killed the district chief and four policemen, including the district police chief, said provincial deputy governor Kazim Allayer. Allayer said the Taliban set fire to several buildings in the district and cut communications lines. Deputy police chief Mohammad Zaman said...

BAGRAM AIRFIELD, Afghanistan, April 6, 2006 – Coalition forces destroyed a rocket pointed at a forward operating base in Ghazni province today. Residents advised Afghan National Army soldiers of the rocket, in the province's Ghazni district. The ANA forces informed their coalition counterparts, who dispatched an explosive ordnance disposal team to the scene and destroyed the munition in place. In a separate incident, also in Ghazni district, a village elder reported the location of a mortar round to Afghan National Police officers who recovered the round and delivered it to coalition forces. An EOD team will destroy it at a...

The program aims to deter Afghan farmers from poppy cultivation, and toward developing a more viable and legal source of agricultural commodity. By Combined Forces Command-Afghanistan BAGRAM AIRFIELD, Afghanistan, Nov. 28, 2005 - Afghan farmers in Ghazni are finding it pays to grow potatoes instead of poppies after they recently received 400,000 Afghan dollars from the Coalition Humanitarian Assistance Department. "The program is very successful. We were able to take care of farmers and to distribute food to returnees coming from Pakistan and Pakistan earthquake victims." U.S. Army Lt. Col. Robert Meier The Ghazni Provincial Reconstruction Team met within the...

WASHINGTON, Nov. 9, 2005 – Afghan National Police forces, acting on a tip that individuals were planning attacks against Afghan and U.S. forces in the Jalalabad, Afghanistan, area, found an improvised explosive device along a well-traveled road Nov. 7, military officials reported today. After notification from Afghan officials, U.S. forces disarmed the device. Afghan National Police forces also detained two men with a large amount of money, small arms and documents outlining enemy activity near Ghazni on Nov. 8. Both individuals remain in Afghan custody. "These incidents are indicative of the success Afghan and U.S. forces have against the enemies...

07:30 U.S. military says American soldier killed, nine wounded by mine near Ghazni in Afghanistan

Jan 31, 8:29 AM ESTDeadly Afghan Blast Likely an AccidentBy STEPHEN GRAHAMAssociated Press Writer KABUL, Afghanistan (AP) -- An arms dump blast that killed eight American soldiers was likely an accident, the U.S. military said Saturday, releasing the first results of an investigation into its worst ever loss of life here.The soldiers died Thursday when a cache of mortar rounds and rifle ammunition discovered near Ghazni, about 90 miles southwest of Kabul, exploded.Military spokesman Lt. Col. Bryan Hilferty said the soldiers were preparing the weapons for disposal when one or more of them detonated."There was a single pop and then...

US fears Afghan blast booby-trap A blast that killed seven US soldiers in Afghanistan may have been caused by a booby-trap, the US military says. The soldiers died while investigating a weapons cache in a village near Ghazni, east Afghanistan, on Thursday. There were signs the weapons dump was booby-trapped but an investigation was continuing, said US spokesman Lieutenant Colonel Brian Hilferty. The US has lost a number of troops while hunting militants in southern and eastern Afghanistan. This has been a costly week for both the coalition and for Isaf Colonel Hilferty said it was unclear how the men...

Jan 29, 2:59 PM (ET) (AP) The map locates Ghazni, Afghanistan, where at least seven U.S. soldiers were killed Thursday, Jan....Full Image KABUL, Afghanistan (AP) - Seven U.S. soldiers were killed and three injured in an explosion Thursday, U.S. Central Command said. One American soldier was missing. An Afghan interpreter also was injured in the 3 p.m. explosion near the city of Ghazni, 60 miles southwest of the capital, Kabul. The soldiers had been working around a weapons cache when the blast happened, Centcom said in a statement. The wounded soldiers were evacuated to a hospital at Bagram Air Base,...

7 US soldiers killed at weapons cache, 3 wounded, 1 missing. No further information.

DoD announced today the deaths of seven soldiers who were supporting Operation Enduring Freedom on Jan. 29 west of Ghazni, Afghanistan. The seven soldiers and an additional soldier, whose status is currently being listed as "duty status whereabouts unknown," were working around a weapons cache when there was an explosion. Another soldier died from wounds suffered in Iraq. Killed were: Staff Sgt. Shawn M. Clemens, 28, of Allegany, N.Y., Spc. Robert J. Cook, 24, of Sun Prairie, Wis., Spc. Adam G. Kinser, 21, of Sacramento, Calif., Sgt. 1st Class Curtis Mancini, 43, of Fort Lauderdale, Fla., Staff Sgt. James D....

Wesley Clark, Chief Wiggles, and moreFrom the February 16, 2004 issue: Remembering Sergeant First Class Curtis "Paco" Mancini02/16/2004, Volume 009, Issue 22 Remembering PacoIn his reporting during the war in Iraq, our colleague Stephen F. Hayes frequently called on Sergeant First Class Curtis "Paco" Mancini, a 17-year veteran of the Davie, Florida, police department who had been recruited to train Iraqi Americans working with U.S. soldiers to liberate their native country. Hayes described Mancini as a "soldier's soldier"--a cliché, perhaps, but nonetheless an apt description of the burly 43-year-old with a shimmering Mr. Clean head.Mancini and his hand-picked colleagues...