April, 1998 — Ever since the Soviet Union invaded Afghanistan in 1979, the country has been at war. The U.S., through the CIA,poured weapons into the country during the 1980s and this helped persuade Moscow to withdraw in 1988. But the fighting has never ended. Ethnic groups and religious sects took up arms against each other after the Soviets pulled out, A look at the lives of women in Afghanistan — held hostage, in effect, by the Taliban. and ravaged the country further. Since 1996, the Taliban militia, a group of fervent Islamic fundamentalists, has dominated the country, although civil war still rages in the north. The Taliban has imposed a harsh interpretation of Islamic justice on Afghanistan, one that singles out women in particular. Women are barred from work except in the medical sector, and girls are not allowed to get an education. The Taliban’s religious police mete out brutal punishment, often in the form of public executions, to those who violate these rules. Photojournalist Harriet Logan’s work tells the story of women under Taliban rule.