KABUL (Pajhwok): The Taliban have rejected news reports that the group guarded foreign forces bases in Afghanistan for the past one year, but government claimed the Taliban would do everything to get power.
LASHKARGAH (Pajhwok): A young woman, who has set up a library for women in southern Helmand province, says literate mothers raise educated children in society. Educated children, who never get involved in war and corruption, work for peace and development.
Humaira Nawrozi, 22, a resident of Helmand, has graduated from a nursing course. She is currently working as a nurse at the main provincial hospital in Lashkargah.
KABUL (Pajhwok): The wives of slain soldiers in northern Kunduz province complain about a miserable life they lead and no help from the authorities, but they hope their problems would resolve to a greater extent if peace is established in the country.
GARDEZ (Pajhwok): A differently disabled person in southern Paktia province calls the return of peace to the country his dream so that other Afghans were spared the ordeal of being maimed by the ongoing conflict.
Khalil, 55, from the Ahmadabad district lost one of his legs in a blast, is currently working at a stone excavation site, farmlands and orchards.
However, he does not view the loss of a leg as incapacity. Reliant on crutches, the man has a shovel and a mattock at the farm land. At times, he also carries other tools needed for stone excavation or farm land.
KANDAHAR CITY (Pajhwok): A widow from southern Kandahar province says the ongoing conflict has taken away all her happiness, but she continues to hope for a better future.
While eagerly awaiting the glad tidings of peace in her benighted homeland, she wants the warring parties to put an end to more than four decades of hostilities and thereby contribute to the cause of peace.
Halima, 50, lives in a tottering house in limits of the 3rd police district of Kandahar City. She has a widowed daughter, three sons -- aged between 11 to 15 -- and two daughters.
CHARIKAR (Pajhwok): Having lost his ability to speak, Abdul Rahim has reunited with his family after 35 years of disappearance. But the darkness of war that alienated him from his loved ones has not yet given way to the dawn of peace.
Abdul Rahim, 64, is a resident of the Regrawan village of the Hesa-i-Doem Kohistan district of central Kapisa province.
KABUL (Pajhwok): Pinning all his hopes on peace, a military officer has been fasting for nine years. He will visit Makkah and break his last fast there if the goal of peace in Afghanistan is achieved.
After marathon negotiations, American and Taliban representative signed a landmark peace agreement in Doha on February 29 -- a breakthrough that is expected to pave the ground for intra-Afghan dialogue.
KANDAHAR/JALALABAD (Pajhwok): Released from captivity, a Taliban member and an Afghan National Army (ANA) soldier both want peace and an end to the Afghan bloodshed. Both say the Afghans should live in peace instead of hated and prejudice.
The deadly conflict in Afghanistan has been ongoing under different names since 1979, but a historic peace agreement between the US and the Taliban in February generated new hopes among Afghans for peace.
JALALABAD (Pajhwok): Nine-years-old Barakatullah lost his father and brother in a blast inside a mosque in eastern Nangarhar province, but he is still hopeful for peace in the country and dreams a peaceful life with his mother, two brothers and three sisters.
He hails from Nangarhar’sHaska Mena Jawdari locality and studies in a welfare religious school in Behsud district, tens of kilometres away from his home, mother and sisters in the search of a bright future.
KANDAHAR CITY (Pajhwok): Mullah Naik Mohammad, who has devoted most of his life to the cause of peace, believes the goal can be achieved only when all people say no to war.
The 60-year-old member of the Public Peace Movement hails from the Daman district of Kandahar province. He has been participating actively in peace campaigns, gatherings and civil movements.