120 Kanishka rules in Peshawar
Kanishka rules the Kushan empire of Afghanistan and northern India from his capital at Peshawar

999 Mahmud of Ghazni
Mahmud, a Turk, builds an empire based on Ghazni (in modern Afghanistan)

1040 Seljuk victory at Dandanqan
The Seljuk Turks win a victory at Dandanqan, which gives them a base in the north of Iran and Afghanistan

1383 Timur destroys Herat
Timur begins twenty years of almost continuous conquest with the capture and destruction of Herat

1410 Timur's son rebuilds Herat
Shah Rukh, son of Timur, begins rebuilding the city of Herat

1450 Persian miniatures in Herat
Herat, under Timurid princes, succeeds Tabriz as the main centre of Persian art

1504 Babur captures Kabul
Babur captures Kabul, making it and eastern Afghanistan the first possession of the Mughal empire

1747 A king for the Afghans
A tribal leader, Ahmad Shah Abdali, is elected king of the Afghans in an event seen as the foundation of the Aghan nation

1839 First Anglo-Afghan war
A British army invades Afghanistan and instals a puppet ruler, Shuja Shah, as the Afghan amir

1842 British abandon Afghanistan
The British abandon Kabul, losing most of the garrison force in the withdrawal to India and bringing to an end the first Anglo-Afghan war

1878 British launch new Afghan war
Three British armies invade Afghanistan, beginning the second Anglo-Afghan War

1881 Britain gives up Afghanistan for second time
The British withdraw from Afghanistan, having achieved nothing in the Second Anglo-Afghan War

1919 Afghanistan achieves independence
Afghanistan finally achieves international recognition as an independent nation

1965 Elections in Afghanistan
Zahir Shah allows the first elections in his kingdom of Afghanistan

1973 Coup ends Afghan monarchy
A military coup deposes Zahir Shah and brings to an end the hereditary monarchy in Afghanistan

1979 Jihad against communists in Afghanistan
Communist measures in Afghanistan provoke a Muslim jihad and the murder of more than 100 Russians in Herat

1979 Soviets invade Afghanistan
Soviet troops invade Afghanistan to suppress anti-communist anarchy

1982 Osama bin Laden joins mujaheddin
The Saudi fundamentalist Osama bin Laden joins the mujaheddin in their fight against the Soviet occupiers of Afghanistan

1985 Mujaheddin unite against Russia
Seven groups of Afghan mujaheddin form a united front against the Soviet army

1988 Al-Qaeda
Osama bin Laden's involvement in the fight against Soviet forces in Afghanistan leads to his development of al-Qaeda

1989 Last Soviet troops leave Afghanistan
The USSR completes the phased withdrawal of its troops from Aghanistan

1992 Mujaheddin capture Kabul
Mohammad Najibullah, Russia's puppet ruler in Afghanistan, is finally overwhelmed in Kabul by the mujaheddin

1992 Mujaheddin proclaim Islamic state
The mujaheddin, after removing from power the Soviet-backed president Najibullah, proclaim an Islamic state

1994 Taliban formed in Kandahar
Mullah Mohammed Omar, in Kandahar, forms a group devoted to fundamentalist Islam and calls it Taliban (meaning students of the Qur'an)

1996 Bin Laden moves to Afghanistan
Expelled from Sudan, Osama bin Laden moves to Afghanistan where he builds training camps for al-Qaeda

1996 Kabul falls to Taliban
The Taliban capture Kabul, driving out rival Afghan guerrilla groups

1996 Najibullah hangs
The Taliban hang ex-president Najibullah and his brother at Kabul's major traffic intersection

1997 Taliban massacre Shia Muslims
Thousands of Shia Muslims are massacred by the Taliban in Mazar-e-Sharif, in a brief spell before they are driven from the city

1998 Taliban take Mazar-e-Sharif
The Taliban recapture Mazar-e-Sharif, giving them control of 90% of Afghanistan

1998 US retaliates against Al-Qaeda
US cruise missiles attack al-Qaeda bases in Afghanistan and a suspected chemical factory in Khartoum

2001 Massoud fatally wounded
Ahmed Shah Massoud, leader of the Afghan Northern Alliance, is fatally wounded in an attack by two suicide bombers

2001 War in Afghanistan
US and UK forces launch military action against Taliban and al-Qaeda forces in Afghanistan

2001 Taliban driven from Kabul
The Northern Alliance, the army of the Afghan resistance to the Taliban, drives the Taliban from Kabul

2001 Taliban driven from Kandahar
A month after the fall of Kabul, the Northern Alliance drives the Taliban from their power base in Kandahar

2002 Taliban toppled
The US-led invasion of Afghanistan sweeps the Taliban from power, ending their protection of al-Qaeda

2002 Osama bin Laden vanishes
In spite of a massive military operation, the terrorist leader Osama bin Laden escapes US pursuit in Afghanistan

2002 Interim government in Afghanistan
Afghan aristocrat and politician Hamid Karzai heads an interim government in his country

2004 Karzai is Afghan president
Hamid Karzai becomes the first democratically elected president of Afghanistan