Taliban Executes Prison Guard, UN Raises Concern Over Afghan Violence

The Jaghori district. Fatima Rajabi was on her way to her home village there when she was abducted by the Taliban.Credit...Jim Huylebroek for The New York Times
The Jaghori district. Fatima Rajabi was on her way to her home village there when she was abducted by the Taliban.Credit...Jim Huylebroek for The New York Times
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Taliban Executes Prison Guard, UN Raises Concern Over Afghan Violence

The Jaghori district. Fatima Rajabi was on her way to her home village there when she was abducted by the Taliban.Credit...Jim Huylebroek for The New York Times
The Jaghori district. Fatima Rajabi was on her way to her home village there when she was abducted by the Taliban.Credit...Jim Huylebroek for The New York Times

The Taliban abducted and executed a female prison guard in the eastern Afghan province of Ghazni, officials and relatives said Monday, as the United Nations expressed concern over the war’s unending toll on civilians.

Fatima Rajabi, 23, who had trained as a police officer, was pulled out of a civilian minibus on her way to her home village in the Jaghori district two weeks ago. After holding her captive for two weeks, the Taliban executed the young woman and sent her body to her family, her brother, Samiullah Rajabi, said.

“My sister was shot eight times,” Mr. Rajabi said.

“When we opened the coffin, her hands were behind her, together and stiff — you could tell her hands were first tied and they had only untied them after they sent the body.”

The United Nations, in a report released on Monday on civilian harm in the Afghan conflict in the first six months of the year, expressed particular concern about the rise of abductions and executions by the Taliban.

There has been an increase of more than a fivefold in civilian casualties tied to abductions since last year, it said.

Women and children made up about 40 percent of the overall dead and injured, with pro-government forces responsible for the death of more children than the Taliban, the United Nations said. Civilian casualties from airstrikes by Afghan forces tripled from the first half of 2019.

“The reality remains that Afghanistan continues to be one of the deadliest conflicts in the world for civilians,” the report noted.

“Each year, thousands of civilians are killed and injured, abducted, displaced and threatened by parties to the conflict in Afghanistan.”

The numbers still marked an overall 13 percent reduction in civilian casualties — which accounts for injuries and deaths — from the same period last year.

That is largely attributed to a major drop in casualties from US airstrikes and attacks by the ISIS branch in the country, which has shrunk significantly after major military operations.

As part of a withdrawal deal signed with the Taliban in February, the US is no longer deploying its air power against the group except in extreme cases, such as when their Afghan allies are being routed.

Although the US has reduced its troops in the country to about 8,600 — it is on schedule to complete a full withdrawal over a 14-month period laid out in the agreement — other elements of the peace agreement, mainly direct negotiations between the Afghan sides over future power-sharing, have stalled as the violence continues.

“At a time when the government of Afghanistan and the Taliban have a historic opportunity to come together at the negotiating table for peace talks, the tragic reality is that the fighting continues inflicting terrible harm to civilians every day,” said Deborah Lyons, the UN secretary-general’s special representative for Afghanistan.

The New York Times



Russian Drone Attacks Kill Three in Northeast Ukraine

23 June 2025, Ukraine, Kyiv: Rescue workers move a dead body from a destroyed residential building following a Russian air strike. Photo: Aleksandr Gusev/SOPA Images via ZUMA Press Wire/dpa
23 June 2025, Ukraine, Kyiv: Rescue workers move a dead body from a destroyed residential building following a Russian air strike. Photo: Aleksandr Gusev/SOPA Images via ZUMA Press Wire/dpa
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Russian Drone Attacks Kill Three in Northeast Ukraine

23 June 2025, Ukraine, Kyiv: Rescue workers move a dead body from a destroyed residential building following a Russian air strike. Photo: Aleksandr Gusev/SOPA Images via ZUMA Press Wire/dpa
23 June 2025, Ukraine, Kyiv: Rescue workers move a dead body from a destroyed residential building following a Russian air strike. Photo: Aleksandr Gusev/SOPA Images via ZUMA Press Wire/dpa

Russian drone attacks killed three people in Ukraine's northeastern region of Sumy, including a child, local authorities said on Tuesday.

It came a day after Ukraine said Russia carried out dozens of drone and missile strikes on its territory, killing 10 people in the capital Kyiv.

Diplomatic efforts to end the three-year war have stalled, with the last direct meeting between Kyiv and Moscow almost three weeks ago and no follow-up talks scheduled, said AFP.

"We have information about three dead. Among them is an eight-year-old boy," said Oleg Grygorov, head of the Sumy region's military administration.

The boy's body was pulled from the rubble of a destroyed house, he added.

"The strike took the lives of people from different families. They all lived on the same street. They went to sleep in their homes but the Russian drones interrupted their sleep -- forever."

Russian drone strikes also left five people wounded in Kharkiv, as well as four others in the Dnipropetrovsk region, authorities said on Telegram.

Drone attack on Moscow

Russia said a drone had targeted a residential building in Moscow overnight, wounding two people, including a pregnant woman.

"About 100 people were evacuated from the building, including 30 children," according to the region's governor, Andrei Vorobyov, who added that two more drones were shot down.

Russia had fired dozens of drones and missiles at Ukraine a day earlier, ripping open a housing block in Kyiv, killing 10 civilians and burying others beneath the rubble.

Separate Russian attacks on Monday in the southern Odesa region left two people dead and another dozen wounded, local authorities said.

Ukraine President Volodymyr Zelensky said a school was hit.

"Sadly, some people may still be trapped under the rubble," he added.

Zelensky met British Prime Minister Keir Starmer during a surprise visit to London on Monday.

Zelensky is due to attend a two-day NATO summit in The Hague starting on Tuesday.

Russia occupies around a fifth of Ukraine and claims to have annexed four Ukrainian regions as its own since launching its invasion in 2022 -- in addition to Crimea, which it captured in 2014.

Kyiv has accused Moscow of deliberately sabotaging a peace deal in order to prolong its full-scale offensive and to seize more territory.