A Vietnamese woman, wearing the traditional “ao dai” long dress, poses for photos along peach blossom flowers ahead of the Vietnamese “Tet” (Lunar New Year festival), in a field in Hanoi, Vietnam, February 2, 2016. (Photo by Reuters/Kham)

Hadeel, 10, asks a passerby for help to pay a medical bill as her father Shahrour, 54, sits in his wheelchair in the Douma neighbourhood of Damascus Syria February 3, 2016. Shahrour said he developed diabetes at the beginning of the war in Syria. A lack of insulin led to his medical condition worsening and his right foot had to be amputated. Recently he also suffered a stroke that paralysed half his face. He and part of his extended family, a total of 18 people, live together and struggle to get by. (Photo by Bassam Khabieh/Reuters)

Fr Pierre Pepper (C) warms up before his amateur boxing match in the town of Banagher in County Offaly March 15, 2015. Fr Pepper has spent the last two months training for an amateur boxing match to raise proceeds for charity. (Photo by Cathal McNaughton/Reuters)

Throughout the course of the long war in Afghanistan, Coalition troops have relied on thousands of military working dogs to help keep them safe, and make their jobs easier. The dogs are trained to detect explosives, to find illegal drugs, to search for missing comrades, or target enemy combatants. Not only are they active on the front lines, but behind the lines they serve as therapy dogs, service dogs, and loyal companions. They also share the same risks as the ground troops, suffering injuries and sometimes death on the battlefields. Gathered here are images of these dogs and their handlers in Afghanistan and back home, from over the past several years, part of the ongoing series here on Afghanistan.

A local resident of Red Hook, Betty Walsh, crosses a flooded street in Red Hook August 28, 2011 in the Brooklyn borough of New York City. While Hurricane Irene has been downgraded to a tropical storm, it has knocked out power to more than 3 million people and is attributed to 15 deaths as it travels up the Eastern seaboard. (Photo by Robert Nickelsberg/Getty Images)

A Filipino worker arranges roasted pigs which they sell in suburban Quezon city, Philippines on Tuesday, December 23, 2014. Roasted pig is popular during Filipino celebrations and traditionally served during a Christmas eve dinner called “Noche Buena” in this predominantly Roman Catholic nation. (Photo by Aaron Favila/AP Photo)

A man dressed in a condom costume walks at Caleta Portales beach, during a summer awareness campaign by the Chilean Corporation for the Prevention of AIDS in Valparaiso city, northwest of Santiago January 9, 2015. (Photo by Rodrigo Garrido/Reuters)

Women labourers work at the construction site of a road in Kolkata January 8, 2015. Across towns and cities in India, it is not uncommon to see women cleaning building sites, carrying bricks and or shoveling gravel – helping construct the infrastructure necessary for the country's economic and social development. They help build roads, railway tracks, airports, and offices. They lay pipes for clean water supplies, cables for telecommunications, and dig the drains for sewage systems. But although women make up at least 20 percent of India's 40 million construction workers, they are less recognized than male workers with lower pay and often prone to safety hazards and sexual harassment. They are often unaware of their rights or scared to complain, say activists now trying to campaign for better treatment of women in the construction industry. (Photo by Rupak De Chowdhuri/Reuters)