Terrorism: 14 Afghan forces and 11 Taliban members killed in separate clashes in Afghanistan on Saturday

At least 11 Taliban members were killed and six others were injured as a result of clashes with police officers in Afghanistan's southern province of Helmand, local police said on Saturday.


Devdiscourse News Desk | Kabul | Updated: 06-06-2020 21:42 IST | Created: 06-06-2020 20:30 IST
Terrorism: 14 Afghan forces and 11 Taliban members killed in separate clashes in Afghanistan on Saturday
Representative image. Image Credit: ANI
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Kabul [Afghanistan], June 6 (Sputnik/ANI): At least 11 Taliban members were killed and six others were injured as a result of clashes with police officers in Afghanistan's southern province of Helmand, local police said on Saturday. According to the police, the terror group attacked checkpoints in Nad Ali, Washir and Sangin districts of the province on Friday night, which resulted in clashes between the Taliban and Afghan forces.

The police added that no Afghan forces were injured in the clashes. The Taliban have not yet commented on the incident.

Meanwhile, Zazi Maidan district residents said that the National Directorate Of Security chief for the southeastern province of Khost was killed on Saturday morning in an attack by unknown gunmen in Khost's Yaqubi district. Local officials in Khost refused to comment on the incident, but a security source said that the director's two bodyguards were injured in the attack. No group has claimed responsibility for the attack.  

Earlier in the day, two separate militant attacks killed 14 Afghan security personnel on Saturday in the northeastern Badakhshan province and the capital of Kabul, officials said. A roadside bomb killed 11 security force members in Badakhshan when it tore through a security vehicle responding to attacks on checkpoints in Khash district. Sanaullah Rohani, the spokesman for Badakhshan's provincial police chief, said a local commander was among the dead, and that four militants were killed in the fighting.

An hour-long gunbattle also erupted in Kabul's Gul Dara district when insurgents attacked a police checkpoint, killing three police officers, said Interior Ministry spokesman Tariq Arian. Both Afghan officials said the Taliban had carried out the attacks, although no one immediately claimed responsibility.

The Taliban on Saturday claimed an attack a day earlier that killed 10 policemen in the southern Zabul province. Afghan government officials said the Taliban ambushed an Afghan police convoy on Friday after setting off a roadside bomb. US forces had carried out two sets of airstrikes Friday against the Taliban in western and southern Afghanistan. These were the first U.S. strikes following a brief cease-fire declared by the insurgents for a major Muslim holiday last month.

Since the signing of a US-Taliban peace agreement at the end of February, U.S. forces have only once before announced a strike against the Taliban, in defence of Afghan forces. The uptick in fighting comes as US peace envoy Zalmay Khalilzad embarked on a new round of diplomatic trips to Qatar, Pakistan, and Afghanistan, according to a US State Department statement Friday.

The US-Taliban agreement was signed to allow American soldiers to return home, ending America's longest military engagement. The deal also calls for Afghans in Kabul and the Taliban to start negotiations to decide the country's future. Those negotiations have been delayed because of political feuding between Afghanistan's President Ashraf Ghani and his rival in last year's presidential polls, Abdullah Abdullah.

(With inputs from agencies.)

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