dynamite, on orders from the Taliban's leader Mullah Omar. In October of the same year, the Taliban "took sledgehammers and axes to thousands of years’ worth of artifacts" in the National Museum of Afghanistan, destroying at least 2,750 ancient works of art. Afghanistan has a rich musical culture, where music plays an important part in social functions like births and marriages and it has also played a major role in uniting an ethnically diverse country. However, since it came to power and even after it was deposed, the Taliban has banned most music, including cultural folk music, and it has also attacked and killed a number of musicians. Ban on entertainment and recreational activities During their first rule of Afghanistan which lasted from 1996 to 2001, the Taliban banned many recreational activities and games, such as association football, kite flying, and chess. Mediums of entertainment such as televisions, cinemas, music with instrumental accompaniments, VCRs and satellite dishes were also banned. Also included on the list of banned items were "musical instruments and accessories" and all visual representation of living creatures. However, the daf, a type of frame drum, wasn't banned. It was reported that when Afghan children were caught kiting, a highly popular activity, they were beaten. When Khaled Hosseini learned through a 1999 news report that the Taliban had banned kite flying, a restriction he found particularly cruel, the news "struck a personal chord" for him, as he had grown up with the sport while living in Afghanistan. Hosseini was motivated to write a 25-page short story about two boys who fly kites in Kabul that he later developed into his first novel, The Kite Runner. Forced conscription and conscription of children According to the testimony of Guantanamo captives before their Combatant Status Review Tribunals, the Taliban, in addition to conscripting men to serve as soldiers, also conscripted men to staff its civil service – both done at gunpoint. According to a report from Oxford University the Taliban made widespread use of the conscription of children in 1997, 1998 and 1999. The report states that during the civil war that preceded the Taliban régime thousands of orphaned boys joined various militia for "employment, food, shelter, protection and economic opportunity." The report said that during its initial period the Taliban "long depended upon cohorts of youth". Witnesses stated that each land-owning family had to provide one young man and $500