NPR's Afghanistan Coverage

National Public Radio's coverage of Afghanistan is excellent:

+ NPR's Afghanistan home page

+ U.S. Leads Efforts to Transform Afghan Police Force
Five years since coalition troops invaded Afghanistan, NPR profiles three of the country's most important national institutions -- the police, the courts, and the national army. A three-part series examines whether they can be useful building blocks for the future of Afghanistan.

+ Afghanistan Works Toward Stability
The police, courts and national army are institutions that must function well if Afghanistan is to grow into a stable democracy

+ Safety, Prosperity Return to Afghan Village
Renee Montagne returns to Istalif, a place she reported on in 2002, six months after the fall of the Taliban regime. The village is an hour north of Kabul -- up a mountain road above the vast, fertile Shomali Plain, which, at the time, was a ruined place. The people there had fought alongside the Northern Alliance.

+ U.S. Officials Assess Afghanistan Progress
Lt. Gen. Karl Eikenberry talks with Renee Montagne about the challenges American troops face with the Taliban. Montagne also talks with Ronald E. Neumann, the U.S. Ambassador to Afghanistan.


Gen. Karl Eikenberry (right), commanding general talks with Afghan National Army soldiers at their remote firebase near the Pakistani border in Afghanistan, Oct. 22, 2006. AFP/Getty Images

These NATO convoys are a familiar sight in the village of Panjwai. The district's assistant police chief says he doesn't have enough policemen to keep the peace without international forces and the Afghan National Army.


Two Kabul policemen patrol near the site of a suicide bombing that targeted police officers. More attacks were expected on this road near the airport, but none of the policemen there had guns. One officer uses a switch snapped from a nearby tree to discourage curious onlookers from congregating around the bomb site.