Afghan Taliban advancing on capital of Kunduz

[Devil Soul]

Afghan Taliban advancing on capital of Kunduz
AFP — PUBLISHED 16 minutes ago

Afghan troops deploy near Chardarah district in Kunduz province on Sunday as they prepare for battle with Taliban militants.—AFP
KUNDUZ: Taliban militants advancing on the capital of a northern Afghan province have captured a key adjoining district, officials said on Sunday, sparking renewed alarm among residents who fear the fall of the besieged city.

The Taliban launched their annual summer offensive in late April with a brazen assault in Kunduz province, coming close to overrunning the provincial capital and sending civi-lian casualties soaring in outlying districts.

The capture of the worst-affected Chardarah district — at the edge of Kunduz city — on Saturday reignited concerns over its potential fall as militants escalate their summer offensive.

“The district has fallen to Taliban after hours of fierce fighting. Twelve Afghan forces have lost their lives and 17 have been wounded,” Chardarah district chief Mohammad Yousuf Ayubi said.

Civilians bearing the brunt of large-scale militant offensive
The militants are now as close as three kilometres to Kunduz city, increasingly hemmed in by the militancy, with sporadic fighting still going on between the Taliban and pro-government forces.

The fall of a provincial capital would be a major setback for the Afghan government, which has been fighting a resilient Taliban militancy since the 2001 US-led invasion of Afghanistan.

Deputy Afghan army chief General Murad Ali Murad said at least 70 security forces were surrounded by Taliban militants in Chardarah.

“We are going to start a military operation to retake the district soon,” he said.

Abdul Sabor Nasrati, the police chief of the province on the border with Tajikistan, said the government was rushing reinforcements to Chardarah.

Civilians are bearing the brunt of a large-scale militant offensive in Kunduz, the keystone of the Taliban’s summer fighting season which is expected to be the bloodiest in a decade.

The province is facing a humanitarian crisis, with thousands of families trapped in a vortex of violence as militancy spreads across the north, beyond traditional Taliban strongholds in the south and east.

Fierce battles between militants and government forces in Chardarah late on Saturday sent terrified residents fleeing towards Kunduz city, carrying babies, livestock and household possessions.

“The Taliban attacked our village and both sides sprayed bullets in all directions,” said 60-year-old Bibi Gul, clutching an infant.

“The Taliban are fighting during the fasting month of Ramazan. They are not Muslims,” she said.

The militants recently rebuffed requests from senior Afghan clerics to halt attacks during Ramazan despite surging civilian casualties.

The streets of Kunduz city were deserted, with shops closed and local administration officials deserting government buildings, residents said, as fears of a Taliban takeover grew.

This year’s Taliban offensive marks the first fighting season in which Afghan forces are battling the militants without the full support of US-led foreign combat troops.

Nato’s combat mission formally ended in December but a small follow-up foreign force has stayed on to train and support local security personnel.

Published in Dawn, June 22nd, 2015

 

[Psychic]

Afghan military counter-attacks Taliban in northern Kunduz province

KUNDUZ, Afghanistan, June 21 (UPI) -- Afghanistan's military is counter-attacking Taliban positions after the militants recently overran a district in the country's northern Kunduz province, according to reports.

Officials say Taliban forces took the Chardara district after hours of fighting that left 12 soldiers dead and 17 wounded. The strategic district holds a road leading to Kabul, Afghanistan's capital.


The Afghan government says it believes Islamic State militants are fighting alongside the Taliban, according to the BBC. It also says it took from Taliban forces the Yumgan district in Badakshan province.

Taliban attacks have increased since a majority of NATO forces left Afghanistan last year.

Last week the militants claimed to have killed up to 25 police officers in raids against checkpoints -- some manned by two to three officers -- in remote areas of Helmand province, in the country's south.

Afghan and Taliban leaders met earlier this month for informal talks in Norway, three days after gunmen broke into an aid agency compound in Balkh province, just west of Kunduz province, and killed nine local humanitarian workers.

Last month, four Taliban fighters died attacking a guesthouse in a diplomatic neighborhood of Kabul, and the group claimed credit for a suicide bombing two days prior that killed five people and injured nearly 70 in Zabul province, to the south.

After U.S. President Barack Obama announced plans for U.S. withdrawal from Afghanistan in 2011, coalition forces officially handed the security operation to Afghan forces in December 2014.

The president's original timetable called for a reduction of U.S. troops in the country to 5,500 by the end of 2015, but in late March Obama announced the U.S. force would maintain its current posture of nearly 10,000 troops, used for advising and assisting Afghan forces, until the end of the year.

According to U.S. and Afghan officials, about 330 Afghan soldiers and police are killed or wounded each week in Taliban attacks, and the level of casualties among those forces in the first 15 weeks of 2015 is 70 percent higher than it was during the same period last year.


Afghan military counter-attacks Taliban in northern province - UPI.com