A Taliban attack on a Kabul guesthouse has left 14 people dead, including nine foreigners, in the most audacious assault by the insurgents in the Afghan capital since the start of their spring offensive.

The number of children killed and wounded in Afghanistan’s war jumped by 34% last year as the Taliban stepped up attacks across the country and continued to lay thousands of roadside bombs, the United Nations said today.

Afghans have rioted for a second day over the burning of a Koran in the US, killing nine people in Kandahar and injuring more than 80 in a wave of violence that underscored rising anti-foreign sentiment after nearly a decade of war.

A top American official at the United Nations mission in Afghanistan has temporarily left the country following a disagreement with his boss over how to respond to the massive allegations of vote fraud in the August 20 presidential election, officials said today.

A FRENCH woman working for the UN High Commissioner for Refugees (UNHCR) was shot dead yesterday in the Afghan town of Ghazni when two men on a motorcycle opened fire on her vehicle with a pistol.