Officials had locked the city down, anticipating talks between U.S. and Iranian delegations. But they didn’t happen. “What did I close my business for?” one business owner asked.

Once promised a move to the United States, Afghan refugees who helped U.S. forces say they face ‘bad or worse’ options: resettlement to Congo or returning home to live under the Taliban.

After the deadliest attack in Afghanistan since the Taliban took over, families searched among photos and remains for signs of their relatives.

Dennis Walter Coyle, a researcher from Colorado, had been held since last year by the Taliban government.

New, friendly media operations and expanded state-run television are pushing Pakistan’s message while independent news outlets face repression.

The war in Iran is choking off Afghanistan’s main economic lifeline and has forced at least 70,000 Afghan workers and students there back home to a nation embroiled in another conflict.

The attack hit a drug rehabilitation facility, Afghanistan said, suggesting that civilians were among the victims. Pakistan said it had targeted a weapons depot.

Pakistani airstrikes have killed at least 75 civilians and displaced 115,000 in Afghanistan, with both sides vowing escalation and no talks in sight.

U.S. and Israeli strikes on Iran have set off a crippling energy crisis and sparked deadly protests in one of the world’s most populous Muslim nations.

Satellite imagery showed flattened warehouses at the base that served as the nerve center of America’s 20-year war in Afghanistan, a prized asset for the Taliban.