Congress has cut federal funding for public media — a $3.4 million loss for LAist. We count on readers like you to protect our nonprofit newsroom. Become a monthly member and sustain local journalism.

Bamiyan Valley in 2010, with the hole where one of the Buddha statues was demolished (photograph by Afghanistan Matters/Wikimedia) After a reconstruction effort covertly built what appeared to be the ...

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 ...

BAMIYAN, Afghanistan—A pair of brick pillars, with an uncanny resemblance to feet, appeared late last year where a giant Buddha stood here. The pillars were meant to hold a platform that would prevent ...

Like all Shiites, Afghanistan's Hazaras are waiting for the reappearance of the Mahdi, but those in the Bamiyan Valley are also hoping for the return of the ancient giant Buddhas torn down in 2001 by ...

This is an archived article and the information in the article may be outdated. Please look at the time stamp on the story to see when it was last updated. MES AYNAK, Afghanistan (AP) — The ancient ...

Clad in a safari suit, sun hat, hiking boots and leather gloves, Zemaryalai Tarzi leads the way from his tent to a rectangular pit in the Bamiyan Valley of northern Afghanistan. Crenulated sandstone ...

BAMIYAN, Afghanistan (AP) — Taliban soldiers on Monday showed off the yawning chasms where two soaring Buddha statues once stood, allowing foreigners a first glimpse of the sandstone rubble that is ...

KABUL (Reuters) - Afghanistan has halted conservation work at a site once occupied by ancient Buddha statues destroyed by the Taliban because the team involved is suspected of secretly trying to ...

When the Taliban were driven from power in 2001, they left behind a broken country and an infamous act of destruction: reducing to rubble two... Preserving Memory of Afghanistan's Giant Buddhas ...