When the People's Democratic Party of Afghanistan ( PDPA ) was formed, Karmal became one of its leading members, and eventually became the leader of the Parcham faction.

Back in Afghanistan he helped topple the Najibullah government, and he became an associate of Abdul Rashid Dostum, one of the men who brought down the communist government.

He later became head of Afghanistan National Front ( known in the media as United National Front ), the largest political opposition to Hamid Karzai's government.

Afghanistan became member of the Universal Postal Union in 1928, and the postal administration elevated to the Ministry of Communication in 1934.

The British became the major power in the Indian sub-continent after the Treaty of Paris ( 1763 ) and began to show interest in Afghanistan as early as their 1809 treaty with Shuja Shah Durrani.

It was the threat of the expanding Russian Empire beginning to push for an advantage in the Afghanistan region that placed pressure on British India, in what became known as the " Great Game ".

On 17 January, Inayatullah abdicated and Habibullah Kalakani became the next ruler of Afghanistan and restored the emirate.

In 330 BC, Alexander the Great ( Alexander III of Macedon ) invaded the land after defeating Darius III of Persia in the Battle of Gaugamela and Afghanistan became part of the new Greco-Bactrian kingdom.

Afghanistan became part of the Achaemenid Empire, after it was conquered by Darius I of Persia.

Ashraf became the new Afghan Shah of Persia soon after Mahmud's death, while the home region of Afghanistan was ruled by Mahmud's younger brother Shah Hussain Hotaki.

For the next 7 years the Hotakis became the de facto rulers of Persia, but their rule continued in the region of Afghanistan until 1738 when Shah Hussain was defeated.

On 9 September 2001, Ahmad Shah Massoud was assassinated by two Arab suicide attackers inside Afghanistan and two days later about 3, 000 people became victims of the September 11, 2001 attacks in the United States.

In 1992, two years after the Soviet withdrawal from Afghanistan, the mujahideen captured Herat, and Ismail Khan became Governor.

It was conquered by the Taliban and became part of the Islamic Emirate of Afghanistan in the mid 1990s.

With the fall of the Soviet Union, Kazakhstan became a major transit country for narcotics produced in Southwest Asia, primarily from Afghanistan.

King Nader Khan was assassinated in 1933 and the throne was left to his 19-year-old son, Zahir Shah, who became the long lasting King of Afghanistan.

In December 2001, Kabul became the capital of the Afghan Transitional Administration, which transformed to the present Government of Afghanistan that is led by President Hamid Karzai.

The city and region became part of the Afghan Durrani Empire in around 1750 when after an agreement was signed between Mir Muhammad Murad Beg and Ahmad Shah Durrani Poplezai, the founding father of Afghanistan.

Hamid Karzai, a prominent figure from the Popalzai clan, became the president of Afghanistan and Zahir Shah's relatives and supporters were provided with key posts in the transitional government.

Tajikistan is slowly rebuilding itself with an integrated government and continues to permit a Russian military presence to guard their border with Afghanistan and the basing of the Russian 201st Motorized Rifle Division that never left Tajikistan when it became independent.

After a friendship treaty in 1750 between Ahmad Shah Durrani of Afghanistan and Mohammad Murad Beg of Bukhara, the Amu Darya ( Oxus River ) became the official border of Afghanistan.

Mohammed Nadir Shah became King of Afghanistan.

Anthropologists, along with other social scientists, are working with the US military as part of the US Army's strategy in Afghanistan.

Afghanistan ( Persian / Pashto:, Afġānistān ), officially the Islamic Republic of Afghanistan, is a landlocked country forming part of South Asia, Central Asia, and to some extent Western Asia.

Currently, Armenia deploys 130 soldiers in Afghanistan as part of the NATO-led International Security Assistance Force ( ISAF ).

Abdur Rahman lived in exile in Tashkent, then part of Russian Turkestan, for eleven years, until the 1879 death of Sher Ali, who had retired from Kabul when the British armies entered Afghanistan.

In the year 1893, during rule of Amir Abdur Rahman Khan, a Royal Commission for setting up of Boundary between Afghanistan and British Governed India was set up to negotiate terms with the British, for the agreeing to the Durand line, and the two parties camped at Parachinar, now part of FATA Pakistan, which is near Khost, Afghanistan.

Besides Turkic people, large part of the Ghaznavid Empire was made up of local Muslim Afghans from what is now Afghanistan and western parts of Pakistan.

As its member, Bulgaria sent a total of 485 soldiers to Iraq ( 2003 – 2008 ) as a participant in the Iraq War, and currently maintains a 608-strong force in Afghanistan as part of ISAF.

Although his reign ended abruptly, he achieved some notable successes, and his efforts failed as much due to the centrifugal forces of tribal Afghanistan and the machinations of Russia and Britain as to any political folly on his part.

Afghanistan was inhabited by the Aryan tribes and controlled by the Medes until about 500 BC when Darius the Great ( Darius I ) marched with his Persian army to make it part of the Zoroastrian Achaemenid Empire.

Since 2001, the Royal Danish Army has been involved in the War in Afghanistan as part of the ISAF.

As of February 2007, Germany had about 3, 000 NATO-led International Security Assistance Force force in Afghanistan as part of the War on Terrorism, the third largest contingent after the United States ( 14, 000 ) and the United Kingdom ( 5, 200 ).

From the Middle Ages to around 1750 part of today's Afghanistan was recognized as Khorasan.

In response to the Soviet occupation of Afghanistan, the Reagan administration in the U. S. increased arming and funding of the Mujahideen thanks in large part to the efforts of Charlie Wilson and CIA officer Gust Avrakotos.

An example of this is in the Nuristan providence of Afghanistan where the Kafir Harp has been part of the musical traditional for many years.

On 7 September 2012, Captain Wales as he is known in the military, arrived at Camp Bastion in southern Afghanistan as part of the 100-strong 662 Squadron, 3 Regiment, Army Air Corps, to begin a four-month combat tour as a co-pilot and gunner for an Apache helicopter.

As part of Operation Enduring Freedom in response to the September 11, 2001 attacks, Italy contributed to the international operation in Afghanistan.

Successor to AGSA ( Department for Safeguarding the Interests of Afghanistan ) and KAM, KHAD was nominally part of the Afghan state, but it was firmly under the control of the Soviet KGB until 1989.

Since the summer of 2005 Lithuania has been part of the International Security Assistance Force in Afghanistan ( ISAF ), leading a Provincial Reconstruction Team ( PRT ) in the town of Chaghcharan in the province of Ghor.

Macedonia has deployed 244 troops to Afghanistan as part of the NATO-led International Security Assistance Force in Afghanistan.