Quqnoos: More than half of the prisoners in Kabul's Pul-e-Charkhi jail are infected with tuberculosis, according to a study supported by the government. The study, authored by Dr Islam Saeed, found that about 55% of prisoners locked in the jail are infected with the deadly disease.      Full news...

PAN: Rampant corruption and consistent violations of rules by top government functionaries have forced the first-ever female head of the Independent Administrative Reform and Civil Service (IARCSC) Commission for the eastern zone to quit her job - but not before exposing brazen malfeasance in the upper echelons.      Full news...

PAN: Five of the 24 electronic attendance system machines purchased by the SEAL project for the Afghan parliament were destroyed on purpose. A number of the employees of Lower House of Parliament stated the damage was done for personal spites and purposes and the wrongdoers are the ones who do not want incorruptibility in the state.      Full news...

IWPR: Remote Afghan province is home to major trading post for heroin destined for Europe and arms for Taliban and other militants. In the middle of the river, local mafiosi cut deals that will arm Taliban insurgents in southern Afghanistan, as well as al-Qaeda and other militant groups in the wider region. In return for Russian-made weapons, they trade Afghan heroin that will eventually be sold on the streets of European cities. The major profits go to those with the clout to call on adequate protection. “The big smugglers are backed by governments in Afghanistan, Pakistan and Central Asia,” he said. “These smugglers can pay huge amounts of money. But we don’t do badly.”      Full news...

Los Angeles Times: In a gruesome public spectacle, Taliban-linked militants on Friday executed two Afghan men accused of spying for the United States, slitting their throats and parading their severed heads before a cheering crowd.      Full news...

PAN: Confirming that corruption is now a deep rooted malice in the country, a global corruption index has placed Afghanistan on 172nd spot in a list of 180 countries. The Global Corruption Report 2008 gives Afghanistan just 1.8 points out of a total score of 10.      Full news...

Quqnoos: Residents claim US soldiers in Bagram airbase have turfed them off their land. More than 1,500 families have been forced to leave their homes near Bagram airbase because American officials on the base have cut off their water supply, residents say.      Full news...

CounterPunch: Can anyone state exactly why foreign troops are fighting in Afghanistan? What is the collective aim, the specific mission, the ultimate objective, of the 60,000 soldiers there? I ask this because as I write the total of US deaths in Afghanistan “and region” is over 450, and news has come in of the killing of more British and American soldiers. And I wonder what all of them have died for.      Full news...

The Washington Post: Afghan opium poppy cultivation grew 17 percent last year, continuing a six-year expansion of the country's drug trade and increasing its share of global opium production to more than 92 percent, according to the 2008 World Drug Report, released Thursday by the United Nations. Afghanistan's emergence as the world's largest supplier of opium and heroin represents a serious setback to U.S. policy in the region. The opium trade has soared since the U.S.-led 2001 overthrow of the Taliban, which had eradicated almost all of the country's opium poppies.      Full news...

RAWA News: A man named Farid, resident of Kabul was prosecuted publicly for stealing a sack of flour. Farid said that he had to earn for a family of thirteen and has done this act out of poverty. He said, “I had no work for 15 to 30 days. After about another 15 days I stole this to feed my children. I was desperate and forced to do so because of my family.”      Full news...

Daily Payman: A father raped his 13-year old daughter in Herat. Gulabshah raped his daughter, 13-year old Freshta, after severely beating his wife and forcing her out of the house. Freshta says, “My father tied my feet and mouth and raped me after throwing my mother out of the house.”      Full news...

PAN: A young girl was raped in Raghistan district of Badakhshan province. 17-year old Razia claimed that 40-year old Altaf Al-Rahman had raped her several times three days back. She told PAN that she wanted justice and the punishment of the rapist but didn’t give any further details.      Full news...

BBC Persian: Some Afghan villagers say that despite the contribution of billions of dollars to this country in the past six years, their lives have not even changed slightly. They said that corruption had caused a lot of money that was supposed to be used in economical projects to come into the hands of a few people.      Full news...

IRIN News: About 490,000 Afghans have been deported from Iran over the past 18 months, the UN Refugee Agency (UNHCR) and Afghanistan’s Ministry of Refugees and Returnees (MoRR) told IRIN. “One hundred and forty thousand undocumented Afghans have been deported so far in 2008, and some 350,000 were deported in 2007,” said Salvatore Lombardo, the UNHCR representative in Afghanistan, adding that most of the deportees were “single males” who had gone to Iran in search of work.      Full news...

The National: Low salaries are forcing many of Afghanistan’s teachers to take on second jobs so they can feed their families. Despite promises that their wages would be increased, schoolteachers in Kabul said there have been few improvements since the US-led invasion in 2001.      Full news...

AFP: Hundreds of protesters took to streets in eastern Afghanistan on Monday after a father and son were allegedly killed by gunfire from US-led soldiers, a governor and witnesses said. Around 200 people demonstrated in the Khogyani district of Nangarhar province.      Full news...

The Observer: British special forces operating on the border between Afghanistan and Iran have uncovered fresh evidence that Tehran is actively backing insurgents fighting UK troops. Documented proof that Iran is supplying the Taliban with devastating roadside bomb-making equipment has been passed by British officials to Tehran, prompting fears that the war in Afghanistan may escalate into a regional armed conflict.      Full news...

PAN: Officials in western Ghor province said thousands people face life threatening hunger due to drought and lack of food items. They warned if food stuff did not arrive on time a humanitarian disaster might take place.      Full news...

PAN: Thousands of families in the south and north of Zaranj (capital city of Nimroz) are faced with shortage of drinking water and most of them have to buy water. More than 20 thousand people in the south of the city of Zaranj have been facing shortage of water for the past ten days. They demanded the solution for this problem urgently.      Full news...

IRIN News: The worsening security situation, unemployment, the food crisis, drought, shelter problems and lack of socio-economic opportunities may force some Afghans who have returned to their country in the past six years to cross international borders again in search of a better life, Afghanistan’s Ministry of Refugees and Repartition (MoRR) warned.      Full news...

Qoqnoos: Saudi Arabia has deported thirteen Afghan children after locking them in jail for six months without telling their families where they were. The expelled children, aged between five and 11, were living illegally in Saudi Arabia , according to Afghanistan’s Ministry of Labour and Social Affairs.      Full news...

Aftenposten: Some cultural treasures allegedly carried out of Afghanistan by a Norwegian soldier are 4,000 years old, and the country wants them back. News magazine Ny Tid reports in its current edition that Afghan authorities are seeking return of ancient coins and a bottle that a soldier recently offered to an Oslo museum.      Full news...

Toronto Star: There's a lot we know about Afghanistan and a lot more we don't. An expert who knows much more than most of us – whose prescient insights I have benefited from for a decade and whom the John Manley commission consulted last year – says Afghanistan will get worse in the coming months.      Full news...

Sky News: For many citizens of this, one of the poorest countries on the planet, life is still exceedingly tough and it is no exaggeration to say they have a daily struggle to survive. No jobs, no money and hope fading fast. "Afghanistan cannot be rebuilt with corrupt people," says Malalai Joya, expelled MP. "Our Government is undemocratic. We have a mafia system where drug lords and war lords are in power with the mask of democracy."      Full news...

IRIN News: "I have cousins in Kabul whom I have never met. But then I also hear that the city is still full of broken buildings, that living costs there are very high and that there is a great deal of insecurity," Ghazala told IRIN. She is torn between wishing to see the city her parents talk nostalgically of, and staying on in Peshawar, where she now has roots.      Full news...

Herald Tribune: Conflicts in Afghanistan and Iraq are creating new waves of refugees, according to the United Nations refugee agency. The report released Tuesday by the U.N. High Commissioner for Refugees shows around 3 million Afghans fled to Pakistan and Iran, and around 2 million Iraqis moved, mainly to Syria and Jordan.      Full news...

Quqnoos: Clashes between Kuchi nomads and ethnic Hazaras in Maydan Wardak have killed 13 people and wounded a further 30, according to a local Member of Parliament. Both sides have blamed each other for the fighting, which started on Sunday in the province’s Behsud district.      Full news...

IRIN News: Ten-year-old Sweeta still remembers the most painful moments of her life when a bulky 35-year-old man raped her in his office in the town of Sheberghan, Jowzjan Province, in northern Afghanistan. At around 10am on 31 January 2008 a vehicle with the markings and number plate of the Afghan National Army (ANA) stopped near a water-point where Sweeta was filling her buckets, according to AHRO.      Full news...

guardian.co.uk: Former guards and detainees whom McClatchy interviewed said Bagram was a centre of systematic brutality for at least 20 months, starting in late 2001. Yet the soldiers responsible have escaped serious punishment.      Full news...

The Toronto Star: The chaplain, Jean Johns, says she recently counselled a Canadian soldier who said he witnessed a boy being raped by an Afghan soldier, then wrote a report on the allegation for her brigade chaplain. In her March report, which she says should have been advanced "up the chain of command," Johns says the corporal told her that Canadian troops have been ordered by commanding officers "to ignore" incidents of sexual assault. Johns hasn't received a reply to the report.      Full news...