Afghanistan seeks Pakistani help to revive stalled peace talks with Taliban

“Fifty of our innocent countrymen, including 10 soldiers, two policemen and 38 civilians, were martyred in the attack”, the defence ministry said in a statement.

A man who was trapped in a building near the airport at the start of the attack said that residents were told to remain inside and take cover in case Afghan or US-NATO forces mistook them for fighters.

Officials said fighters attacked a perimeter area of the huge and heavily fortified complex on Tuesday evening, initially taking up position in a school in a residential area of the site, which houses both a civilian airport and military base.

Afghan and coalition officials said the attackers were well away from the runway, the main military part of the airport and installations used by foreign troops and advisers.

There has been a surge in violence in the area recently, with the airport in Kandahar targeted by a rocket attack on Monday.

As the Kandahar assault was under way, Afghan President Ashraf Ghani arrived in Islamabad on Wednesday for the Heart of Asia regional conference that aimed to revive peace talks with the Taliban.

Local commanders have reportedly said they intercepted militants communicating in Urdu, commonly spoken in neighbouring Pakistan.

The last of the 11 Taliban militants involved in the attack was killed more than 24 hours after the assault got under way, the Thursday statement added.

Nine terrorists were also killed, the ministry said.

Relations between Ghani and the NDS had been strained since at least the fall of Kunduz, which caught security forces badly unprepared and which an inquiry last month blamed on poor leadership.

The most devastating one happened in 2012 when Taliban combatants wearing US military uniforms succeeded in storming Camp Bastion in neighboring Helmand province, demolishing aircraft worth hundreds of millions of dollars.

“Whenever there is talk about peace talks, the Taliban launch big attacks”, Kabul-based military analyst Atiqullah Amarkhil said.

The attack in Kandahar province-a Taliban heartland-comes as the insurgents have expanded their footprint in Afghanistan in recent months.

Pakistan, too, has said that it is committed to renewing the Afghan peace process.

But sharp differences over how to deal with Pakistan also contributed to his departure, which leaves Afghanistan without a defense minister and head of intelligence at a time when the insurgency is gaining potency.