People push a stretcher carrying an injured victim after a mosque blast inside the police headquarters, at a hospital in Peshawar on January 30, 2023. A blast at a mosque inside a police headquarters in Pakistan on January 30 killed at least 25 worshippers and wounded 120 more, officials said. (Photo by Zafar Iqbal/AFP Photo)

Iranian school girls show their hands with pro-government slogans and an anti-Israeli slogan which reads in Farsi: “Death to Israel”, during a rally in front of the former U.S. Embassy in Tehran, Iran, marking 44th anniversary of the seizure of the embassy by militant Iranian students, Saturday, November 4, 2023. (Photo by Vahid Salemi/AP Photo)

A man carries floats as he walks on an algae covered beach as a truck collecting algae passes by, along the coastline in Qingdao, Shandong province, July 6, 2015. (Photo by Reuters/China Daily)

Bjorn, aged 5, smiles as he poses with a Owl butterfly during an event to launch the Sensational Butterflies exhibition at the Natural History Museum in London, Britain March 23, 2016. The exhibition opens to the public on March 24 and runs until September 11. (Photo by Dylan Martinez/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.

Artists from the Beijing Dance Academy perform to celebrate the Chinese Lunar New Year in Budapest, capital of Hungary, February 6, 2019. (Photo by Attila Volgyi/Xinhua News Agency/Barcroft Media)

A Sukhoi Su-35S jet fighter of the Russian Knights aerobatic team performs during the International Maritime Defence Show “Fleet-2024” in Kronstadt, outside St. Petersburg, Russia, Friday, June 21, 2024. (Photo by Dmitri Lovetsky/AP Photo)

Volunteers use flour to clean birds following an oil spill caused by an incident involving two tankers damaged in a storm in the Kerch Strait, in the village of Vityazevo near the Black Sea resort of Anapa, Russia on December 20, 2024. (Photo by Sergey Pivovarov/Reuters)