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Afghanistan - Hutchinson encyclopedia article about Afghanistan (Site not responding. Last check: 2007-10-30) |
 | | During the 1950s, Lt-Gen Sardar Muhammad Daud Khan, cousin of King Muhammad Zahir Shah (ruled 1933–73), governed as prime minister and introduced a programme of social and economic modernization with Soviet aid. |
| | President Daud, after steering a centrist course, was assassinated in 1978 in a military coup, and Nur Muhammad Taraki, the imprisoned leader of the radical Khalq (masses) faction of the banned communist People's Democratic Party of Afghanistan (PDPA), took charge as president of a revolutionary council. |
| | The Taliban seized power and a six-member interim council of clerics, headed by Muhammad Rabbani, was installed and strict Islamic law imposed, including the prohibition of the employment and education of females, compulsory beards for men, and a ban on television. |
| encyclopedia.farlex.com /Afghanistan (3182 words) |
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