Recent Afghanistan pictures

U.S. Marines keep watch as fellow Marines search for Taliban arms caches on March 31, 2009 in the abandoned town of Now Zad in Helmand province Afghanistan. Marines from Lima Company of the 3rd Battalion, 8th Marine Regiment have been fighting Taliban insurgents, whose frontline position is just over a mile away from their base. Military commanders say the civilian population fled during heaving fighting between British troops and Taliban fighters several years ago, leaving a ghost town, now a battleground between the U.S. Marines and Taliban



An Afghan man waits with his sick child to be treated by French doctors of the 27th BCA (Bataillon de Chasseurs Alpins) on February 19, 2009 at the Morales-Frazier Forward Operating Base (FOB) in Nijrab, Kapisa province.



Canadian soldiers from the NATO-led coalition check a dry river in the Taliban stronghold of Arghandab district in Kandahar province, southern Afghanistan, March 12, 2009.



A soldier from the 2nd Gurkha Regiment of the British army cleans his weapon on Patrol Base Woqab in Musa Qala, Helmand province March 27, 2009.



Men work at Taqcha Khana salt mine in Namak Aab district of Takhar province northeast of Kabul March 10, 2009. The mine, from which salt is excavated with basic tools and transported by donkeys, produces more than 23,000 tons of salt per year.



U.S. Army soldiers with the 1-6 Field Artillery division patrol an area where there has been reported Taliban presence February 18, 2009 in Gandalabog, Afghanistan.



An Afghan village seen from above, amidst fields of opium poppy and wheat in Farah Province, Afghanistan on March 17, 2009. U.S. Marines, who expanded into the area last November, are soon to be joined by thousands more American troops as part of an additional 17,000 U.S. forces being sent to the war.




Canadian soldier Pte Chris Kezar from November Company 7th platoon of the NATO-led coalition rests after heavy fighting against insurgents in the Taliban stronghold of Zhari district in Kandahar province, southern Afghanistan, March 20, 2009.