JAHANABAD, Pakistan (AP) – When the Taliban blew the face off a towering, 1,500-year-old rock carving of Buddha in northwest Pakistan almost five years ago, it fell to an intrepid Italian ...

From almost the first moment the Taliban were driven from power at the end of 2001, art historians, conservationists and others have dreamed of restoring the Buddhas. Tarzi, however, has another idea.

In March 2001, the Taliban shocked the world by dynamiting the giant Buddhas of Bamiyan. Two decades later, they are back in power and claim to be making strides to preserve Afghanistan's ...

MES AYNAK, Afghanistan (AP) — The ancient Buddha statues sit in serene meditation in the caves carved into the russet cliffs of rural Afghanistan. Hundreds of meters below lies what is believed to be ...

KABUL, Afghanistan -- The radical ruling Taliban movement began smashing all statues from Afghanistan's rich cultural past today, defying international appeals to save the ancient artifacts. Taliban ...

GENEVA -- Swiss-based scientists have created a model of a huge Buddha statue destroyed by the former Taliban regime in Afghanistan and said Wednesday they hope it will be used to rebuild the ancient ...

DUSHANBE, Tajikistan -- While Taliban soldiers in Afghanistan destroyed two immense statues of Buddha, art historians in neighboring Tajikistan were meticulously restoring a huge reclining Buddha from ...

BAMIAN, Afghanistan -- The giant Buddhas are rubble now, huge piles of rock beneath the cliffside where they stood for 1,500 years. Thick metal casings from bombs and artillery shells that brought ...

There is something grimly mesmerizing about the image of Taliban fanatics setting out to demolish two of the world's greatest and largest statues of Buddha. Fifteen hundred or so years ago, these ...

"I think the Taliban have understood how much the destruction of the Bamiyan Buddhas damaged their reputation," said Valery Freland, director of the ALIPH foundation, the International Alliance for ...