The ban appears to apply to domestic and international news organisations, and although the country´s intelligence agency refused to provide details, an official at the government´s media unit confirmed the move.[break]
Afghanistan´s constitution guarantees freedom of speech and domestic critics said the ban, which came after one of the deadliest days this year for NATO troops, amounted to censorship.
An Afghan spokesman said live television coverage of attacks -- such as that in Kabul last Friday that killed 16 people -- could alert militant organisations to police actions against their operatives on the ground.
"While journalists are going to the scene of ongoing attacks, they endanger themselves and also they help inform the enemy with their live broadcasts or reporting of the progress of (police) operations," Hakim Ashir, the head of the Government Media and Information Centre, told AFP.
US envoy Richard Holbrooke said Washington would raise its concerns with the Afghan government.
Secretary of State Hillary Clinton and other US officials "are concerned and will make our support of free access by the press clear to the government", Holbrooke, the US pointman on Afghanistan and Pakistan, told reporters.
"We don´t like restrictions on the press. My whole career has been devoted to supporting that," said Holbrooke.
The Afghan National Directorate for Security (NDS) refused to comment when contacted by AFP. A spokesman said only that media organisations would be "invited in small groups to meetings and the new rule will explained to them".
Afghanistan´s Pajhwok news agency said some organisations -- including the BBC and Al-Jazeera -- had already been informed.
It reflects an earlier attempt to ban coverage of Taliban attacks during elections in August, under threat of expulsion for international reporters and confiscation of equipment for Afghans.
Afghan media groups described the latest move as censorship, saying it contravened the constitution, while the New York-based Committee to Protect Journalists said it was up to news organisations to decide what they report.
"The Afghan authorities should allow reporters to work freely," said CPJ Deputy Director Robert Mahoney.
Rahimullah Samandar, head of the Afghanistan Independent Journalists´ Association, was more outspoken.
"We see this as direct censorship. This is prevention of reporting and contravenes the constitution which says access to information is the right of everyone," he said.
A reporter with a network told about the restrictions said live coverage probably helped save lives as people who watched telecasts "know to stay home and stay safe".
A major achievement since the Islamist regime of the Taliban was overthrown in 2001 was the growth of a thriving media industry, he said, with more than 20 private television channels and hundreds of newspapers and radio stations.
The government´s Ashir said: "The government of Afghanistan supports freedom of speech and media, but live reporting of ongoing incidents has created some problems recently."
Last Friday´s assault in Kabul was launched by heavily armed militants, some wearing explosives-packed suicide vests and police uniforms.
In one of the deadliest attacks on foreigners in the capital, nine Indians, a Frenchman, an Italian man and three Afghan policemen were among the dead.
Meanwhile, Britain announced that one of its soldiers had been shot dead Tuesday at a vehicle checkpoint in southern Afghanistan, a day after six NATO troops were killed in one of the worst days for the alliance this year.
The latest death brought to 108 the number of foreign soldiers to have died in the Afghan war so far this year, according to an AFP tally.
Monday´s toll of six NATO soldiers fell just short of the seven soldiers that independent website icasulties.org reported killed on January 11, making it one of the worst days of the year for international forces in Afghanistan.
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