Leaders of the Pakistan-based Muslim insurgent groups vow to continue fighting until they topple the Marxist regime and proclaim Afghanistan an Islamic republic.

The United States, the Soviet Union, Pakistan, and Afghanistan sign an agreement in Geneva after years of painstaking efforts by the UN to end one of modern history's most bitter conflicts.

It also says that the fighting has caused an estimated one million deaths and that hundreds of thousands of widows, orphans, and disabled people will need sustained care for years to come.

The 169-page report cites extensive damage to agriculture, with the wheat-growing area reduced to 70% of its prewar size and one-fifth of the nation's livestock lost.

The countryside, it says, is "littered with mines, unexploded bombs, hand grenades, shells and other ordnance [that will] pose a major threat to life and limb for years to come."