afghanistan

[click on thumbnails to see full image]
A densely populated hillside in Kabul above a city street
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Traffic heading north out of central Kabul towards a densely populated hillside
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In a Kabul street two women and a small boy buy biscuits from a pedlar
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In Kabul a family crosses a busy street despite heavy traffic
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Schoolchildren, girls veiled, boys bareheaded, mingle in a Kabul street
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A shop selling the famous Afghanistan carpets in central Kabul
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Waiting to buy bread--nan--in Kabul's Chicken Street
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Making bread--nan--in a Chicken Street bakery, Kabul
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In a Kabul shop women's clothes never seen in public
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The atrium within the entirely modern Kabul City Centre shopping mall, a hotel on the righhand side
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A male pastime--watching non-fatal partridge fighting in a Kabul park on a Friday morning
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In popular partridge fighting contests the prized birds. very costly, are rarely hurt
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Wicker cages containing partridges are a common sight in Afghanistan towns
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A young kiteflyer, his kite somewhere over Kabul city, on the Teppe Maranjan plateau
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Two kiteflyers happily posing; under Taliban rule the simple pleasure of kiteflying was banned
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A proud horseman restraining his lively stallion as he shows it off at Teppe Maranjan
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The tomb of recent kings at Teppe Maranjan on a hill above Kabul
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The early 16th century tomb, gracefully restored, of Moghul emperor Babur in the gardens he founded
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In Babur's gardens, Kabul, is a small white marble mosque built in 1647 by Shah Jahan of Taj Mahal renown
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Babur's gardens in Kabul are a haven in a city with a fast expanding population
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Family life goes on--boy with a book, baby in Huggies--in a hillside house
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A prosperous family, unmarried daughters in red, leaving Babur's gardens in Kabul
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The sad ruin, on the outskirts of Kabul, of the once royal 1920s palace of Darulaman
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In Kabul's museum, its prime treasures elsewhere, an attendant dusts a Nuristan carved ancestral figure
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An eyecatching loving couple in the Kabul museum's collection of Nuristan carved wooden deities and ancestor figures
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A couple walking (in 2009) in a crowded Kabul street
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Local transport in Charikar, north of Kabul
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A Charikar rickshaw, built over a motorbike, seats seven, plus the driver
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Homemade icecream is a popular feature in this Charikar restaurant
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A nomadic Kuchi family, its black tent and its goats, camped beside the fastflowing Panjshir river
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In the Panjshir valley the portrait of local hero, the assassinated Ahmad Shah Massoud, is everywhere
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An elaborate tomb and culture complex honoring local hero Massoud, assassinated in 2001, under construction on a hilltop in the Panjshir valley
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Russian tanks still litter (in 2009) the Panjshir valley and other rural corners of Afghanistan
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Portraits of Massoud by Reza Deghati adorn the hilltop site of the tomb in the Panjshir valley where (in 2009) Russian tanks still have not been removed
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Jangalak village in Panjshir valley, birthplace of local hero Ahmad Shah Massoud, assassinated in 2001
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One of many peaceful villages in the Ghorband valley between Kabul and Bamiyan
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Stark setting for a Ghorband valley village
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Women in the Ghorband valley collect forage for their animals
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Springtime ploughing for potatoes, with cows and a wooden plough, in the Ghorband valley near Bamiyan
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A fertile valley in Bamiyan province looking towards the snows of the Hindu Kush
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The famous cliffs of Bamiyan where giant 6th-century Buddhas, destroyed by the Taliban, once stood
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The Bamiyan cliffs, with their empty niches, dominate peaceful valley farms
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The Bamiyan cliffs, with their empty niches, dominate the peaceful valley
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Along the red sandstone Bamiyan cliffs are many caves, some today providing shelter for desperate people
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Further west the Bamiyan cliffs provide shelter, a stout back wall, even building material
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In Bamiyan province snowy mountains, the southern extension of the Hindu Kush, are setting for bare highlands as well as green valleys
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A Hazara shepherd grazes his sheep in Bamiyan province grasslands
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A Hazara shepherd in Bamiyan province highlands
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In Dragon Valley, Bamiyan province, youngsters perch on the back of a monstrous myth-surrounded petrified dragon
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Beside the great dragon in Dragon Valley is a shrine to Ali, son-in-law of the prophet Mohammed, who slew it
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Shahr-e Zohak, ruins on a mountaintop where the grandson of Gengis Khan was killed
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The ruins of Shahr-e Zohak date to the 5th century; the grandson of Gengis Khan was killed here
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Every clifftop, this one close to Bamiyan, seems to tell a thrilling story
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Band-e Amir, six vividly blue linked lakes in Bamiyan province (this one Haibat) are now a national park
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Band-e Amir, six vividly blue linked lakes in Bamiyan province are now a national park
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The six lakes of Band-e Amir are linked by natural dams in a spectacular formation
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Waterfalls adorn the lakes of Band-e Amir where there is also a small shrine, at right
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An unexpectedly jolly sight in a brilliant blue lake at the national park of Band-e Amir in Bamiyan province
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