The New York Times: A series of home raids by C.I.A.-trained Afghan counterterrorism forces in the last month resulted in the deaths of at least six innocent civilians, according to Afghan government officials, reviving an issue that has been a chronic source of tension between Afghanistan and the United States.      Full news...

TOLOnews.com: A police force member claimed on Monday that he was severely beaten up by the guards of second Vice President Mohammad Sarwar Danish. The footage filmed by TOLOnews shows a policeman, Aimal Qaderi, all covered in blood with his head severely injured. He said that he was beaten up after he stopped the cars of Danish’s guards who he said were trying to cross a road illegally.      Full news...

TruthDig: “The Kite Runner,” Khaled Hosseini’s 2003 novel, featured a pivotal and highly controversial scene in which one of the young male protagonists is raped by an older youth. That harrowing section of the best-selling book highlighted the rampant sexual abuse of children in Afghanistan. Now, a revelation—even more horrifying—has implicated real-life U.S. soldiers serving in that country.      Full news...

RAWA News: The ousting of the Taliban regime and the establishment of a new government in 2001 brought with it a hope for the emergence of a truly just and democratic society. Many were hopeful that the warlords would go behind bars for the atrocities they had committed during the 1990s. On the contrary, they were reinforced during the Karzai’s administration. Regional warlords and power brokers such as Atta Noor in the North, Sherzai in the South and then East and Ismail Khan in the West of the country, turned the country into fiefdoms and often defied the presidential decrees if they were against their personal interests.      Full news...

RAWA.org: Every nation in the world celebrates the people who have contributed constructively to their respective countries. This contribution can be in the fields of education, science, literature, peace, economy or any other field of life that is of benefit to the citizens of the country. These celebrated people are often called the Heroes of Nation.      Full news...

Hambastagi.org (Translated by RAWA): Every year on 9th September, the death anniversary of Massoud, the people of Kabul experience barbarism of the factional kind (reference to factional infighting during the 1992-1996 civil war and the commission of horrendous crimes during that time). A group of reckless men belonging to Shorae Nizar roamed the whole city wildly, spreading terror, and causing disturbance and concern among the residents of Kabul.      Full news...

IRIN: When 30 Kalashnikov-toting men came to Mohammad Miakhil’s house demanding he donate a large sum of money and three tonnes of wheat to their Afghan government-aligned militia, he knew it was time to leave. “They gave us two hours to pay,” said Miakhil. “If not, they would set our house on fire and kill my family.” Miakhil could not afford to hand over such a large portion of his harvest and 120,000 afghanis (about 1,000 USD), so his family joined the exodus from Khanabad, a district in northern Kunduz province...      Full news...

1TV: An Afghan man and a woman received 100 lashes each after they were found guilty of committing adultery in western Ghor province. The punishment was given in public on Monday and after they were found guilty in a primary court. Judges said that the punishment was based on Sharia laws and that the man and woman confessed that they had sexual relations.      Full news...

PAN: Relatives of the two persons killed by bodyguards of the Western Zone Ulema Council chief on Saturday staged a protest demonstration against the council chief, Maulvi Khudadad Saleh. Yesterday at about 8:30pm, a civilian car crashed into a vehicle carrying bodyguards of Saleh as part of his convoy, prompting the guards to open fire at the civilian car, killing two occupants.      Full news...

The Express Tribune: A US raid this week on an illegal weapons cache allegedly belonging to former jihadi leader Jan Mohammad – a close ally of Afghan Chief Executive Dr Abdullah Abdullah – has exposed the dangerous presence of warlords in the conflict-ridden country. Since American fighter jets blew up the arms depot at Charikar, the capital of Parwan province on June 29, Afghans have been seeking an explanation as to why pro-government warlords have stored such huge caches of arms, especially in the north when the country has nearly 350,000 security personnel.      Full news...

TOLOnews.com: Police in northwestern Faryab has detained a former provincial council member accused of killings and supplying arms and ammunition to the Taliban. Angar Tokhi was arrested from his neighbor’s house, chief of Faryab criminal investigation department told TOLOnews. “Angar Tokhi is accused of murders in Almar district,” he said. “Tokhi has also been accused of handing over arms to the insurgents.”      Full news...

The Killid Group: Many hundreds of people have been armed along the border, and their numbers are growing. The police commander of Kunduz has posted a video on a social network site of armed men in national dress saying they would soon recapture the Gultapa area from the government’s opponents. While local authorities are all for the strategy, there are serious misgivings among people.      Full news...

TOLOnews.com: The commander of an armed group in Farah has been accused of the kidnap, rape and torture of a 17-year-old boy, said the Afghanistan Human Rights Organization on Thursday. According to the human rights group, the boy was allegedly kidnapped in Farah province by Hamid Bakhto, a relative of the provincial council head.      Full news...

The Washington Post: A massive portrait of a middle-aged man towers over the Ferris wheel and giant mushrooms at an amusement park here. At night, the image is bathed in an ethereal light, visible from a quarter-mile away. His admirers call him “Ustad,” or “Teacher.” His critics call him the King.      Full news...

TOLOnew.com: Hundreds of residents in the Ashtarlay district of Daykundi province embarked on a protest on Tuesday over what they call the presence and harassment of irresponsible armed men. They have as a result called on the National Unity Government (NGU) to deal with the issue‎.      Full news...

PAN: Residents of Khanabad district of northeastern province of Kunduz claimed hundreds of families in their area displaced due to increased insecurity, claiming their houses were looted by illegal armed individuals. Heavy clashes between illegal armed individuals and militants over the past four days left four armed men and eight rebels dead and 20 others wounded.      Full news...

The Killid Group: No government can any longer shut its eyes to the problem of armed groups in the country. They are behind the almost daily crimes in Kunduz, Badakshan, Baghlan, Parwan and Bamyan provinces. Local authorities in Kunduz accuse the Kabul government of supporting the men, some 4,000 in number, who are behind the kidnappings, rape and robberies particularly in the province’s Khan Abad and Dasht-e Archi districts.      Full news...

IWPR: An IWPR investigation has found that Ghor province in western Afghanistan is in the grip of around 40 warlords backed by thousands of paramilitaries. The armed groups they lead are accused of murder, kidnapping, gang rape, theft and drug trafficking, all carried out with impunity. The numerous groups typically range in size from 200 to 1,200 men, giving a total somewhere between 8,000 and 10,000.      Full news...

TOLOnews.com: Two young girls, one 12-years-old and one only three, were abducted and raped in Takhar province in just the past week, local officials have confirmed. The parents of the 12-year-old girl, who live in the Yangi Qala district, said their daughter was abducted by armed men late at night six days ago, then taken somewhere and raped.      Full news...

Khaama Press: The family of a gang-rape victim has called on President Mohammad Ashraf Ghani to ensure the perpetrators are tried as they face death threats from the armed gang. The woman was gang-raped a group of eight men in northeastern Badakhshan province of Afghanistan five years ago, Tolo News reported on Monday.      Full news...

The Killid Group: While the process of disarming local commanders has stretched over six years little has changed on the ground in Kunduz, Ghazni and Bamyan. Locals complain of harassment and extortion at the hands of armed gunmen - both individuals and members of the Afghan Local Police (ALP).      Full news...

The Chronicle Herald: With the eyes of the world focused on the brutal violence of ISIS in Syria and Iraq, and the power play of international brinkmanship in eastern Ukraine, the recent dramatic developments in Afghanistan have been given rather short shrift in the western media.      Full news...

PAN: Powerful individuals, illegal commanders and armed men were involved in most of 245 sexual abuse cases occurred in various provinces over the past six months, a survey said on Wednesday. The survey by the New Afghanistan Women Association (NAWA) was conducted in Kunduz, Takhar, Jawzjan, Herat, Balkh and Sar-i-Pul provinces, interviewing 2,000 people including women.      Full news...

The Wall Street Journal: News of a gang rape rattled the Afghan capital, stirring fears of a return to lawlessness amid a prolonged political crisis that is threatening to plunge the country into civil war. Afghan police said this week they arrested six men in connection with the rape, which took place in the early-morning hours of Aug. 23.      Full news...

PAN: Continued fighting between two warlords in central Kapisa province has forced many residents to leave homes for safer places, local said on Wednesday. The former mujahedeen commanders in Koh-i-Band district have been locked in hostilities for the past many years. Residents told Pajhwok Afghan News both sides continued to use heavy weapons against each other, inflicting heavy losses on people as well.      Full news...

Al Jazeera America: Before dawn on June 1, a group of U.S. special forces and Afghan army commandos arrived by helicopter to the east of Alizai, a farming hamlet in Andar district in Taliban-controlled territory in central Afghanistan. They moved from house to house, arresting any fighting-age men they found, while the local Taliban fighters, who had been sleeping in a mosque at the other end of the village, fled without a fight.      Full news...

PAN: The movements of illegal gunmen have increased in the capital of central Parwan province after the second round of presidential elections, locals complained on Saturday. Fardin Hakimi, who runs a shop in Charikar, said the growing movements of illegal armed men had raised concerns among the people. “Wearing plainclothes and caps, dozens of these gunmen can be seen daily in Charikar.”      Full news...

PAN: Following the killing of a local by the alleged connivance of relatives of Wolesi Jirga and another senior official, hundreds of people on Saturday held protest in the Qaisar district of northwestern Faryab province, demanding arrest of the perpetrators. Mirwais was gunned down by unidentified men on Saturday evening in the district.      Full news...

Vice News: A warlord, an illiterate drug smuggler, and a CIA-funded killer walk into a war. That’s not the setup to a joke — it’s the punchline to America’s failed intervention in Afghanistan. President Barack Obama said yesterday that US forces would be all but out of the country by the end of 2016.      Full news...

RT: Recruited to help run Afghanistan’s security and intelligence operations in the aftermath of the US war against the Taliban, the country’s most feared security official dubbed “torturer in chief” now has settled in a pink two-story house in California.      Full news...