Posted on 09/20/2003 12:45:56 AM PDT by HAL9000
A chief town of district of south-east under control taliban since one month
The talibans and their allies of organization Al-Qaïda took control in August of the chief town of a frontier district of Pakistan in the south-east of Afghanistan, exerting since an intense military pressure on all the zone, according to local persons in charge's for safety questioned by the AFP.
The Afghan pro-governmental forces "were driven out of Barmal in mid-August after an attack of several hundreds of talibans and members of organization Al-Qaïda come from Pakistan", affirmed with the AFP the head of provincial safety Daulat Khan.
"Barmal is since then under control of the talibans", confirmed the vice-governor of the province of Paktika, Sado Khan.
"They militarily did not settle in the city, but they go and come freely in the bazaar", specified under cover of anonymity a collaborator of the vice-governor.
The pro-governmental forces "were withdrawn more in north in the district close to Orgun and do not intervene beyond any more" of the limits of this district, explained to the AFP Jalil Zadra, the head of the police force of the district of Orgun, to 60 km in the north of Barmal and to 200 km in the south of Kabul.
The zone is today completely inaccessible to the representatives of the central government of Kabul and with its police force, organizes, militiamans or soldiers, noted the AFP.
The fall of Barmal to the hands of the talibans reinforced the pressure on the basis of American military Shkin, with less than 10 km in the north of Barmal, which already before mid-August one of was exposed to the attacks of the talibans.
From now on, the attacks are almost daily against the base - rocket, arms light or mortar - and the ambushes very frequent against the military convoys, however heavily armed and on-protected, come from the base close to Orgun, according to the headquarters of the American army of Bagram, in the north of Kabul.
At least twenty combatants of the Afghan Militias Forces (MFA - Afghan militia equipped and framed by the US army) have been killed for three months in fixings, according to the person in charge for the MFA for the base of Orgun. Two US soldiers were killed on August 31 in a ambush close to Shkin.
In this arid and mountainous area, very favourable with the guerrilla, at least four other frontier localities are inaccessible today because of insecurity, according to Afghan military persons in charge's with Orgun: Manakandaw, Kamardin, Mirsafar, Engurada.
Groups of tens of talibans, "often ordered by Arabs and of Tchétchènes", affirm the military authorities of Orgun, maintain a permanent insecurity there, sometimes with the complicity of the local tribes pachtounes.
After having tried to install another base advanced with Manakandaw, the American army thus had to be withdrawn two months ago under the pressure of the attacks of the talibans, according to testimonys' of several members of the MFA. Accompanied by MFA, the soldiers American patrol in these zones with high-risk only in convoy of at least seven Humvee vehicles framed by helicopters, according to one their interpreters with Shkin.
Questioned by the AFP, the majority of the Afghan military persons in charge made state since July of a recrudescence of the activities of the combatants antigovernment, organized better and equipped better.
Orgun, Sharan, capital of the province of Paktika, as well as the interior of the province seem relatively saved by these violences, even if groups of 20 to 100 talibans infiltrated and hidden in the mountains are regularly located there, according to the local police force.
Taliban recaptured town in August, says Afghan official
Agence France-Presse
Urgun (Afghanistan), September 20 -
The Taliban have been in control of a Southeast Afghan town near the Pakistan border since hundreds of them attacked government offices a month ago and sent officials fleeing, a provincial security head said.
Barmal, 220 kilometres south of Kabul and 15 km from the border, was seized by the militants in August, Paktika province security chief Dawlat Khan said on Friday.
Government forces were "chased from Barmal in mid-August after an attack by hundreds of Taliban and Al-Qaeda members coming from Pakistan," Khan said in Urgun, 40 kilometres north of Barmal.
"Barmal has been under Taliban control since then," deputy provincial governor Sado Khan said.
Afghanistan's Southeast border regions are bearing the brunt of an apparent resurgence by the hardline militia, almost two years after they were smashed from power by a United States-led military assault.
Afghan officials, aid workers and the US military have reported an increase in armed attacks especially against humanitarian workers in recent months.
The US military, which has 10,000 troops hunting remnants of the Taliban and their Al-Qaeda allies, has said the Taliban were trying to revive their hardline regime.
Afghan and US officials have reported seeing assailants retreating across the porous border into Pakistan after attacking troops and officials.
At least 10 government militiamen were killed in last month's attack in Barmal. Some had their throats slit.
The local administration building was destroyed by the attackers, who seized a large supply of weapons, according to soldiers who took part in the fighting.
An official close to the deputy governor said the Taliban were "not militarily settled into the town."
"But they come and go freely in the market," he said, requesting anonymity.
Pro-government forces "withdrew north to the neighbouring district of Urgun and have not intervened beyond" the district boundaries, Urgun police chief Jalil Zadra said.
The area is currently totally inaccessible for government representatives and security forces, he said.
Former Barmal security commander Haji Zaher, who lost two sons in the August attack, abandoned his post and fled to neighbouring Khost province.
All other district officials had also fled, according to Zadra.
With the retreat of government forces, the only military in the area are US troops based in Shkin, on the border 10 kilometres from Barmal.
US troops there have come under repeated attack from suspected Taliban since mid-August. The US military has said Shkin was the most regularly attacked base in Afghanistan.
US soldiers on Thursday fought an hour-long gunbattle near Shkin after coming under machine gun and mortar fire. The attackers "retreated toward the Pakistani border," a US military spokesman said.
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