India fears that a Taliban-controlled Afghanistan would benefit Pakistan. The government is trying to protect its strategic interests.

Amid a mounting economic crisis, the Taliban has pledged to pay three months' worth of lost wages to public employees. The group boasted of new revenue, but did not specify where it came from.

A Taliban ministry has asked TV networks to stop broadcasting programs that the ultra-conservative group deems immoral. They have said that the directives are not obligatory, but rather "a religious guideline."

Are those protesting against Covid-19 restrictions just an angry few, or do they represent a much deeper malaise?As the Northern Hemisphere hunkers down for a new winter wave of Covid restrictions, backlash over these curbs is rearing up in Central Europe, the Netherlands and the French Caribbean islands of Guadeloupe and Martinique. Some of the pushback is coming from fringe conspiracy theorists or muscle men, but many others have also lost trust in authorities and in what they see as heavy-handed measures and mixed messages. Is the unfiltered "anything goes" rhetoric that wins elections finally coming home to roost?

Humanitarian workers are racing against time to deliver aid as winter looms in Afghanistan, UN officials told DW. The situation on the ground is already desperate and "looks like it's going to get worse."

At least one person has been killed in an explosion in Kabul. The largely Shiite neighborhood has previously been targeted by attacks by the Islamic State-Khorasan group.

By imposing new restrictions on the media and female actors, the Taliban have once again reaffirmed their misogynistic ideology, rights advocates have said.

International travel picked up over the summer, but Covid-19 is still expected to cost the global tourism industry some €1.8 trillion in 2021. Also, French finance minister Bruno Le Maire remains optimistic about the recovery despite concerns over the Omicron variant, and farmers in India continue their protest movement despite concessions from the government.

Human Rights Watch says that more than 100 former Afghan security personnel have disappeared or been killed by the Taliban since they came to power in August. The actual number could be much higher than that.

US Secretary of State Antony Blinken told the Foreign Affairs Committee that the previous presidency left Joe Biden little choice but to complete the withdrawal. Republicans called it "an unmitigated disaster."

For almost a decade, international forces in Mali have been trying to help fight Islamist groups that threatened to take over the country in 2012. But today, the government still only controls the capital and a small area around it. DW's Fred Muvunyi reports.

More Afghans facing extreme poverty are turning to opium production as a means of survival. Despite promises to the contrary, the Taliban are unlikely to oppose cultivation of the narcotic cash crop.