PAN: A spacious ancient stone room has been discovered in the Araban area of Jalrez district in central Maidan Wardak province, officials said on Thursday. Locals initially noticed a small hole in a mountain where they were quarrying stones, Attaullah Khogyani, the governor’s spokesman, told Pajhwok Afghan News.      Full news...

PAN: Increasing rocket and magnetic bomb attacks have worried Kabul residents, who believe lack of deterrence and coordination among security forces allows such assaults. This last week saw six magnetic bombs exploding and as many rockets landing in the heavily-fortified central capital, leaving four people dead and 16 others wounded.      Full news...

The Huffington Post: Anti-war campaigners said the UK’s mission in Afghanistan had failed and had left a legacy of tens of thousands of civilian deaths as well as a series of unanswered questions. British troops today handed Camp Bastion over to Afghan forces - bringing to an end their bloody campaign in Helmand province - by lowering the Union Jack for the last time.      Full news...

Khaama Press: An Afghan woman named Zahra ran away with a young man after her father forced her to marry a 65-year-old villager. She and her lover were caught after almost two years and both were jailed for adultery. Adultery is prohibited in Islam and Afghanistan is a country with 99% people.      Full news...

International Business Times: The Obama Administration has been given a December deadline to explain why it has withheld more than 2,000 graphic images depicting Iraqi and Afghanistan detainees being tortured by the US military. A federal judge has ordered the US government to explain, one photograph at a time, why it blocked the images from being released to the public.      Full news...

Reuters: Opium poppy cultivation in Afghanistan has hit an all-time high despite years of counter-narcotics efforts that have cost the US 7.6bn USD (4.7bn GBP), according to a US government watchdog. The UN Office on Drugs and Crime reported that Afghan farmers grew an “unprecedented” 209,000 hectares (523,000 acres) of opium poppy in 2013, surpassing the previous high of 193,000 hectares in 2007, said John Sopko, the special inspector general for Afghanistan reconstruction.      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...

Stars and Stripes: Mohammad Wazir is 12. Or maybe 13. He doesn’t know for sure. One thing is certain: Growing up in rural Helmand province, Mohammad has seen more war than anyone should, let alone a young boy.      Full news...

The Bureau of Investigative Journalism: Afghanistan is the most drone bombed country in the world. The US has been using its Predator and Reaper drones to kill people in Afghanistan since November 2001. Research by the Bureau of Investigative Journalism, featured this week in a report by the Remote Control project, has found more than 1,000 drone attacks hit the country from the start of 2008 to the end of October 2012.      Full news...

Cicero Magazine: The correspondence between the chief of the US watchdog on Afghanistan reconstruction and the administrator of the UN’s development agency over a trust fund bankrolling the Afghan police force is an entertaining read. In a series of letters, John Sopko, special inspector general, alleged that the UN agency mismanaged the trust fund, known as LOTFA, allowing the Afghan interior ministry to milk 200 million USD in “deductions.”      Full news...

Hambastagi.org (Translated by RAWA): The Solidarity Party of Afghanistan (SPA) denounced the thirteenth anniversary of the occupation of Afghanistan by the US and NATO in a demonstration in Kabul. This was also in defense of the resistance of the people of Kobani, especially its female fighters.      Full news...

The Killid Group: A non-governmental group, New Afghanistan Women Association (NAWA), says crimes against women and children have increased because of continued official indifference and a law enforcement system that looks the other way to help the perpetrators. NAWA’s new research in six provinces – Kunduz, Jowzjan, Herat, Balkh, Takhar and Sar-i-Pul – shows a 30 percent increase in rape cases. Shafiqa Habibi, director of the non-governmental women’s group, says in most cases the abusers were “powerful individuals, commanders and irresponsible gunmen” or the relatives of the victims. “They don’t fear punishment.”      Full news...

NPR: No country grows as many opium poppies or produces as much illicit opium as Afghanistan. In 2013, opium production soared to a record high of 5,500 tons, according to the United Nations Office on Drugs and Crime. A study published last week adds to a growing body of research showing that Afghanistan also has a high rate of drug usage — about 5.1 percent, or 1 in 20 people. Opioids and cannabis were the most popular.      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...

PAN: Various unwanted factors have led to the closure of more than 80 percent of female schools in western Ghor province, it is learnt. Ghor is home to some 8000 registered schools, including 190 schools for girls. More than 125, 000 boys and 83, 000 girls study in these schools. The provincial chapter of Independent Human Rights Commission (AIHRC) has expressed its grave concerns over the closure of so many schools in Ghor.      Full news...

The Killid Group: According to a folk story, Ghazni was once the most prosperous of cities but the gins destroyed it one night. On Aug 4 the Taleban detonated trucks piled with explosives to attack Ghazni Police and the Afghan National Directorate of Security (Intelligence).      Full news...

PAN: A female journalist has been stabbed to death in broad daylight in Mazar-i-Sharif, the capital of northern Balkh province, officials said. Palwasha Tokhi, who worked for the Bayan Radio station in Balkh, came under attack inside her house near the Hazrat Ali (RA) mausoleum in the 3rd police district late on Tuesday.      Full news...

Vice News: They were on their way back from a wedding with their families. Four women, one of them pregnant, traveling in a district that’s safer than most in Afghanistan. Paghman is not without its insurgents, but the violence raging in places like Helmand feels far from here. Much like the rest of Afghanistan, however, violence in Paghman unrelated to the insurgency is on the increase.      Full news...

Hambastagi.org (Translated by RAWA): Farah, a province in western Afghanistan along the Iranian border, is one of the most insecure provinces in the country. Its defenseless inhabitants are victims of the treacherous conspiracies of the warmongers every day. Besides the deadly poverty, instability and insecurity that plagues the people of this isolated province, they have witnessed countless instants of bombings by the occupier forces, mass killings and beheadings, suicide bombings, kidnapping of children, and the shooting of their working children by the mercenary Taliban and non-Taliban forces.      Full news...

Xinhua: Widows of victims of terrorist attacks in Afghanistan have resorted to begging in the streets with their young children forced to do odd jobs in order to survive. This was the harsh reality that the Afghan government has to face as it observed starting Tuesday Haftai Shahid or Martyrs Week to pay homage to Afghans who have lost their lives during the protracted war and instability in Afghanistan.      Full news...

PAN: Eleven civilians have been killed and 12 others wounded, including children and women, during a joint operation and a foreign forces airstrike in eastern Kunar province, the governor said on Wednesday. Shujaul Mulk Jalala told Pajhwok Afghan News that the operation had been underway since Tuesday in the Badbel Dara area of Narang district. A raid conducted by coalition forces also caused civilian casualties.      Full news...

Human Rights Watch: An Afghan court’s conviction of seven men for a gang rape was wholly undermined by numerous due process violations and political interference, Human Rights Watch said today. The court of appeals should competently, impartially, and independently conduct judicial review of the September 6, 2014 trial and the resulting death sentences.      Full news...

PAN: Dozens of families in central Daikundi province are resisting the construction of a town in the provincial capital, alleging land had been allotted for the project with the connivance of the governor. The protesting families accused Governor Abdul Haq Shafiq of complicity in grabbing 100 acres of land for the town -- a charge that Shafiq vehemently rejected.      Full news...

Khaama Press: A female Afghan lawmaker Huma Sultani has said she supports the Taliban ideology and endorses an Islamic State in Afghanistan, similar as the Islamic State of Iraq and Syria (ISIS). An audio tape of Huma Sultani which circulated in social media websites shows that she has close links with the Taliban group in Afghanistan.      Full news...

Amnesty International: NATO risks leaving Afghanistan with a legacy of impunity unless the unlawful killings of civilians by international forces over more than a decade are addressed through justice and reparations, Amnesty International said ahead of a key international summit on 4-5 September in Newport, Wales. Among the agenda items for the NATO heads of state and government attending will be the support and training of the Afghan National Security Forces (ANSF), who will assume full responsibility for security in the country by the end of the year.      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: Police on Tuesday paraded three more suspects allegedly linked to a group that gang rapped four women and looted passengers last month in the Paghman district of central Kabul province. The gang members in police uniform reportedly deprived passengers of their valuables and sexually abused four women. Three members of the gang have already been held in police custody.      Full news...

PAN: A Pakistani airstrike injured 15 people, including women and children, on the outskirts of Khost City, the capital of southeastern Khost province, near the Durand Line, officials said on Saturday. The airstrike took place on Friday evening in the Lakaro area, said the governor’s spokesman, Mubariz Zadran. He said the 15 people injured in the attack had been taken to the civil hospital.      Full news...

Khaama Press: At least six women were killed in single day in western Afghanistan as violence as against women soars. Local officials in Herat province have said at least five of women were killed in this province by relatives and unknown gunmen.      Full news...