Taliban defiant as battle for Sangin rages

The Afghan Defense Ministry has deployed reinforcements and insists the battle isn’t over, but for the time being all indications are that the Sangin District in Helmand Province has effectively fallen, leaving the Taliban in full control of the area.

Although much attention has been focused on Sangin, fierce fighting has been underway across much of Helmand, a traditional stronghold of the Taliban and a major center for opium that United States and British troops fought for years to control.

The Taliban spokesman for southern Afghanistan, Qari Yousaf Ahmadi, claimed on Twitter that “Sangin district has completely collapsed to the Taliban” and that they had captured Afghan soldiers and ammunition. The town is an important poppy-growing area and sits on lucrative transport routes for drugs and weapons.

Instead, British troops, which are part of the UKs delegation to the United Nations Resolute Support Mission, were sent to the district of Sangin to help the Afghan forces. In spite of repeated calls for help addressed to the central government in Kabul, no reinforcements were sent.

“The military is in position and the operation is ongoing”, Stanekzai told media in Kabul.

The Taliban claimed responsibility for the Monday suicide attack on US troops that killed six near Bagram Air Field near Kabul. News storiesdisplayed here appear in our category for worldwide and are licensed via a specific agreement between LongIsland.comand The Associated Press, the world’s oldest and largest news organization.

Helmand borders Pakistan’s violence-hit southwestern Baluchistan province and the war zone is located around 90 miles west of the provincial capital, Quetta, the Pakistani city from where Afghan officials allege the Taliban’s leadership council named “Quetta Shura” directs the insurgency.

“It is an organization that lacks a political leader and a political agenda, but because of the support and mentorship they received from the outside, they have increased military capability”, said Davood Muradian, founding director of the Afghan Institute for Strategic Studies, a Kabul think tank.

Districts across Helmand have been threatened by the Taliban in recent months. Former U.S. Ambassador to NATO, Kurt Volker, spoke to CCTV America about what’s happening and the implications. Both took place before midnight.

“Taliban rumors that they have captured the district are not true”, he said. His deputy, Mullah Akhtar Mansoor, succeeded him, causing internal ructions and delaying the likelihood that a peace dialogue with the Afghan government, halted after the announcement of Mullah Omar’s death, will restart in the foreseeable future.

“I have already said earlier that we and the Taliban have channels for exchanging information”, Kabulov added, in remarks reported by Interfax.

The Pentagon released a report last week warning that the security situation in Afghanistan would deteriorate as a “resilient Taliban-led insurgency remains an enduring threat to USA, coalition, and Afghan forces, as well as to the Afghan people”.