Kabul [Afghanistan], May 9 (ANI): Amid the ongoing drawdown of US troops from Afghanistan, the war-torn country has seen a spike in the incidents of violence in recent weeks, leading to casualties of Afghan security forces and civilians.
Afghan security officials on Saturday said that the Taliban in the past week tried to take over some strategic areas in at least six provinces of the country, but security forces repelled their offensives.
Over 1,000 Taliban terrorists have been killed and wounded in several encounters with the Afghan security forces during this period in Kandahar, Helmand, Farah, Herat and Baghlan provinces, said General Yasin Zia, the Afghan Chief of Army Staff.
Alongside Ghazni city, Khawja Omari, Jaghato, Waghaz and Khogyani districts have also faced deadly battles in the past days. Meanwhile, local officials in Baghlan said that hundreds of people have taken up arms to fight the Taliban.
Afghan Ministry of Defence said that offensive operations have been launched to eliminate the Taliban in areas under their control. It added that at least 250 Taliban fighters were killed in at least seven provinces in the last 24 hours and thousands more in the last four months.
The Taliban, however, has rejected the Afghan Defence Ministry report that they had suffered significant losses due to heavy fighting over the first four months of this year.
According to the ministry’s data, the period in question was the deadliest for the Taliban, as 6,320 group members were killed and 2,790 others were injured in clashes in different provinces across the country. The highest number of casualties in the past four months — 2,099 — was reported in the southern Kandahar province, as reported by Sputnik.
Amid this surge in violence, US special envoy Zalmay Khalilzad on Friday had said that the United States will stand with Afghans who support the Republic if the Taliban do not choose peace.
“If the Taliban do not choose peace, a future based on consensus and compromise, then we will stand with Afghans who strive to keep the Republic intact,” Khalilzad had said in a tweet.
US condemns attack near school in Kabul, calls for immediate end to violence
Washington [US], May 9 (ANI): The United States on Saturday (local time) condemned the attack near a school in Afghanistan capital Kabul, which left 53 people dead and several others injured.
“The United States condemns the barbarous attack near a girls’ school in Kabul, Afghanistan. We offer our condolences to the victims, many of whom were children, and their families. We call for an immediate end to violence and the senseless targeting of innocent civilians,” said US State Department spokesperson Ned Price.
“We will continue to support and partner with the people of Afghanistan, who are determined to see to it that the gains of the past two decades are not erased,” he added.
The death toll from a series of blasts at a school in Kabul rose to 53 on Saturday, a source in the Ministry of Public Health told Sputnik.
At least three blasts happened near Sayed-ul-Shuhada High School in west of Kabul on Saturday afternoon, TOLO News reported citing the Interior Ministry.
The attack started with a car bomb explosion and was followed by two rocket attacks, sources said. No group or individual has so far claimed responsibility for the blasts. Moreover, the Taliban denied involvement in the attack.
This comes after US President Joe Biden had said that the United States will withdraw all its troops from Afghanistan before the 20th anniversary of the September 11 terror attacks.
Meanwhile, as the United States’ “war on terror” enters a new phase as President Joe Biden has begun withdrawing all US forces from Afghanistan, al-Qaeda has claimed that its war with America is far from over.
In an exclusive interview with CNN conducted through intermediaries, an al-Qaeda official said that “war against the US will be continuing on all other fronts unless they are expelled from the rest of the Islamic world”. (ANI)
