Afghanistan's ruling Taliban have said the two Bamiyan statues of Buddha have been totally destroyed.
"The work of the destruction of the two statues has been complete. The work was completed last evening and now there is no trace of the two statues there," the Afghan Islamic Press quoted Taliban Information Minister, Mr Qudratullah Jamal, as saying.
The Taliban, a radically orthodox Islamic movement, last month announced it would destroy all statues in the country despite an international outcry and appeals to spare the artefacts of Afghanistan's rich cultural past.
World attention was drawn to the two Buddha statues in the central province of Bamiyan, which towered 53 metres (175 feet) and 38 metres (120 feet) and were hewn into a cliff about 1,500 years ago.