KABUL: Taliban militants overran a second district headquarters in as many days on Sunday, while Afghan police launched a search for some 30 villagers still missing two days after a mass kidnapping blamed on the militants in the southern province of Kandahar.
At least eight police were killed in separate battles against Taliban, who have stepped up their attacks in the north and west of the country, laying siege to district headquarters, said Mohammad Mustafa Moseni.
Moseni said the Taliban launched four assaults on Taywara district headquarters in western Ghor province, early Sunday and “we had no choice but to retreat,” the provincial police chief said.
He said police have taken up positions about 8 km from the district headquarters while they wait for reinforcements to launch a counterattack.
After capturing Taywara district, Taliban fighters stalked the corridors of the only hospital looking for wounded Afghan National Security personnel to kill, said provincial Public Health Department Director Ghulam Nabi Yaghana.
He said he received reports that they killed four or five patients.
The area is remote and telephone communication is sporadic, he told The Associated Press in a telephone interview from the provincial capital of Ferozkoh. He said Taliban entered the 20-bed hospital early Sunday. It is believed all the dead are military or police personnel, he said.
The Taliban, in a statement to the media, announced the capture of Taywara district headquarters. The statement, however, said 46 Afghan government security forces were killed. The Associated Press could not independently verify either death toll.
In northern Faryab Province’s Lawlash district two police were killed late Saturday night when Taliban used the cover of darkness to attack the district headquarters, setting fire to the police headquarters buildings, Abdul Karim Yourish, provincial police chief spokesman, said Sunday.
Government offices as well as the police headquarters were located inside the compound, he said.
In recent days, Taliban have launched dozens of attacks in northern Afghanistan, temporarily closing a key highway between the capital Kabul and northern Afghanistan. The attacks reflect the Taliban’s efforts to apply pressure on government troops and police across the country and not just in their strongholds in the south and east of Afghanistan.
Meanwhile, 70 people were abducted Friday from their village along the main road in the south, seven of whom were found dead the following day alongside the highway, from the city of Kandahar to Tarinkot in Uruzgan province.
Around 30 people have been released while 30 others remain missing, Kandahar police spokesman Zia Durrani told AFP.
It remained unclear why the villagers were seized. But some officials said they suspected the Taliban had kidnapped or killed them for suspected cooperation with the Western-backed government, which the militants are striving to topple.
The insurgents have a heavy presence in Uruzgan, a poppy-growing area.
On Sunday they denied involvement, while confirming they had attacked police checkpoints in the area.
“Our mujahideen killed a number of local police and pro-government militias there, also capturing 17 suspects who were later released after interrogation. We have not killed or kidnapped any civilians,” the Taliban said in a statement.
Civilians are increasingly caught in the crosshairs of Afghanistan’s worsening conflict as the Taliban step up their annual spring offensive launched in April.
Highways passing through insurgency-prone areas have become exceedingly dangerous, with the Taliban and other armed groups frequently kidnapping or killing travelers.
In July Taliban fighters closed a highway connecting Farah to Herat city in the west, stopping a bus and forcing 16 passengers off it. They shot at least seven of them while the remainder were taken hostage.
Elsewhere in the country, the Taliban on Sunday captured a district in the northern province of Faryab after an overnight attack that triggered hours of heavy fighting, said provincial police spokesman Abdul Karim Yourish.
He said troops had retreated two kilometers from the center of Kohistan district. There was no word on casualties.
Local media on Sunday also reported that the Taliban had overran Taywara district in the central province of Ghor, though there was no immediate official confirmation.
There has been a surge in fighting in several northern and southern Afghan provinces in recent days, including in Helmand in the south where 16 Afghan police officers were killed by a US air strike on Friday night.
The strike, the latest setback in Washington’s efforts to pacify the country, hit a compound in Gereshk district, large parts of which are under Taliban control.
Afghan troops and police are battling largely alone on the ground against the insurgency, after US-led foreign forces withdrew from most combat operations in December 2014.
The US is actively considering sending more troops to Afghanistan and US commanders there have requested thousands of extra soldiers on the ground.
The US contingent now numbers about 8,400, and there are another 5,000 from NATO allies, a far cry from the US presence of more than 100,000 six years ago. They mainly serve as trainers and advisers.