Afghanistan's Other Half

There were, once, Buddhas in Bamiyan, known to locals as Salsal and Shamama, standing in the shadow of the Hindu Kush. In 2001, only two years after he had promised to protect them, Taliban leader Mullah Mohammad Omar forced townspeople to drill charges of dynamite into the statues. With the help of anti-tank mines and rockets, the statues that had stood since the sixth century were reduced instantly to rubble. Every soul in Bamiyan wishes it did not happen.

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