Taliban closing in on key city in the south

Pitched battles were reported late Wednesday in Nawa district, just a few kilometres south of Lashkar Gah city, compounding fears that the provincial capital could fall despite stepped up USA air strikes to beat back the insurgents. Atal said that if the government does not show support for Helmand the people would be asked to take up weapons and fight the Taliban.

“It remains an ongoing security concern and there has been fighting down there for the last several weeks”. The Taliban have seized some areas only a few km from the city center, said Omar Zwak, spokesman for the provincial governor. Families, children, women, all have to sleep on the streets. “We need urgent support”.

The geographic control by Taliban fighters of the areas around Lashkar Gah means that should the city fall in the coming days, Afghan ground forces won’t be able to proffer a direct challenge, as they did in Kunduz previous year, abetted by US airpower. Reinforcements were expected soon according to provincial police chief Brigadier General Aqa Kenotz A huge opium harvest has helped fund the Taliban.

The residents of Lashkar Gah said the city was practically besieged, with roads from neighbouring districts heavily mined by the insurgents.

The fighting has closed all the highways leading into Lashkar Gah, forcing up prices for food and other basics inside the city. They added that soldiers are running out of food and police checkpoints into the city are falling. South of Lashkar Gah, the Taliban are making gains.

Last September, the Taliban seized the northern city of Kunduz for a few days before they were pushed out by Afghan forces, backed by US airstrikes. Of Helmand’s 14 districts, the Afghan government considers four entirely under Taliban control, four facing a high threat of collapse, four with a medium threat but limited government activity, and only two as safe.

The fighters are flushing an elite new commando force into Helmand, which they call “Sara Khitta” – the Red Brigade in Pashto.

He said that the number of people arriving for treatment after being caught up in fighting in districts around the city had been reduced in recent days by road closures.

Afghan and United States officials said they would not allow another urban centre to be captured, after the Taliban briefly overran northern Kunduz city last September in their biggest victory in 15 years of war. The fighting in Helmand has now gone on for several weeks, but the tide of the battle seems to be favoring the Taliban. “Majority are coming to Lashkar Gah”, Omar Zawak, a spokesperson for the provincial governor, told AFP.

At the time, Afghan President Ashraf Ghani and the commander of US and North Atlantic Treaty Organisation forces in the country, Gen. John Nicholson, vowed no other city would fall to the insurgents.

Washington has deployed several hundred troops in Helmand in recent months to aid Afghan ground forces.