The Islamic Republic of Afghanistan is a landlocked country located in the heart of Asia, bordered by Turkmenistan, Uzbekistan and Tajikistan in the north, the People's Republic of China in the far northeast, Pakistan in the south and east, and Iran in the west.

Friendly, beautiful Afghanistan was once well known on the backpacking circuit as the place to stop for unparalleled hospitality, fantastic food and great hiking. Things, sadly, have changed.

Since 1979, Afghanistan has suffered almost continuous conflict, beginning with the Soviet invasion followed by a civil war and finally by the 2001 US intervention in which the ruling Taliban government was toppled.

More than 25 years of war and Taliban rule has left the dramatic countryside peppered with landmines and reduced many of the finest monuments and minarets to rubble. The poverty left in war's wake has taken an impossible human toll and encouraged the theft and sale of priceless national treasures.