At least three Afghan crew members were killed Saturday when a U.S.-manufactured Black Hawk helicopter they were flying crashed, the Taliban’s defense ministry said. The statement said that five others were wounded in the accident during a training session overseen by Afghanistan's defense ministry at the capital of Kabul. It is not known how many U.S. choppers remain in the hands of the Taliban government. As the U.S.-backed Afghan government collapsed in mid-August last year, dozens of Afghan pilots fled to Central Asian countries, including Tajikistan and Uzbekistan. Afghan air force pilots played a key role, alongside their U.S. counterparts, in the 20-year war against Taliban insurgents that ended with the departure of foreign troops last year. The airstrikes inflicted heavy casualties among the Taliban and repeatedly drove them from positions they had seized in different parts of the country. Read: UN warns 6 million Afghans at risk of famine as crises grow Last year about 140 Afghan pilots and others were flown out of Tajikistan then to Abu Dhabi in the United Arab Emirates and their final destination in the U.S. Separately, three civilians were wounded when a bicycle bomb exploded in Kabul, said Khalid Zadran, spokesman for the the capital's police chief. The attack occurred in the Shai neighborhood and there was no immediate claim of responsibility for the blast.   Recently, the Islamic State group has claimed similar attacks in the country. IS has waged a bloody campaign of attacks on Taliban targets and minority groups, particularly Shiites whom the extremist IS considers heretics.

The 19th session of the current parliament that began Sunday will continue till September 1. The session will start at 5pm on each working day. The decisions came at a meeting of the Business Advisory Committee (BAC) of the current parliament held at Jatiya Sangsad Bhaban in Dhaka. It also decided that the speaker may extend or cut the working days of the current session. Committee Chair and Speaker Dr Shirin Sharmin Chaudhury presided over the meeting. Read: Speaker nominates 5-member panel for 19th Parliament session Prime Minister Sheikh Hasina, Amir Hossain Amu, Tofail Ahmed, Sheikh Fazlul Karim Selim, Obaidul Quader, Rashed Khan Menon, Hasanul Huq Inu, Anisul Huq, Golam Mohammad Quader, Anisul Islam Mahmud and Noor-E-Alam attended it. Parliament returned to the session at 5pm, offering the highest forum for the people's representatives to be heard for the first time since the onset of the much-talked-about power cuts and hike in fuel prices.

The 13th session of the 11th Parliament, which was the budget session, was prorogued on Saturday, after 12 sittings. Speaker Dr Shirin Sharmin Chaudhury read out the prorogation of the President at 2:45pm. Before that, the speech of Father of the Nation Bangabandhu Sheikh Mujibur Rahman in the United Nations was screened in the House. Seven bills were passed in the House during the session that started on June 2. READ: Parliament passes Finance Bill, allows whitening of undisclosed money On June 3, Finance Minister AHM Mustafa Kamal placed the Tk 603,681-crore budget for 2021-22 fiscal and it was passed on June 30. The supplementary budget for 2020-21 fiscal was passed on June 7. Eighty-five MPs took part in the general discussion on the budget. READ: Parliament passes new budget of ‘lives and livelihoods’ Healthcare services of the country were on top in the budget discussion as the health minister often came under fire by the MPs.