Hundreds of villagers fled a southern Afghan town overrun by Taliban militants, fearful of a NATO attack on the insurgent fighters who have hoisted their trademark white flag over the town's ransacked government center, residents said.
NATO's outgoing commander, General David Richards, said that "very surgical and deliberate" force would be used if needed to solve the crisis in the town of Musa Qala.
Afghan Defense Minister Abdul Rahim Wardak said: "If there is a need for an operation, there will be one."
Colonel Tom Collins, a spokesman for NATO's International Security Assistance Force, said on Saturday that NATO was watching the situation, but that no forces were in Musa Qala.
NATO troops pulled out of the town in October after the government and village elders signed a peace agreement.
"It is only a matter of time before [the] government re-establishes control," Collins said.
However, he said NATO had reports that Taliban militants had reinforced defensive positions.
Abdul Baqi, a villager who fled Musa Qala with family members on Saturday, said residents feared a bloody clash was imminent after the Taliban fighters swarmed the town on Wednesday and Thursday, temporarily taking village elders hostage.
"I'm going to stay with my relatives and will return only if the situation gets better," Baqi said while sitting in his pickup truck in the nearby district of Gereshk.
Resident Mohammad Wali said Taliban fighters had hoisted a flag over the damaged government compound, and another villager said hundreds of residents fled.
British troops fought intense battles with Taliban fighters in Musa Qala in the second half of last year. British forces left Musa Qala in October after elders and the Helmand provincial governor struck a truce that turned over security to local leaders.
A purported Taliban spokesman, Qari Yousef Ahmadi, said that the Taliban took over the town in response to NATO attacks he said violated that agreement -- an apparent reference to a NATO airstrike outside of Musa Qala that killed a senior militant leader and his deputies late last month.
But NATO said the Taliban had never been party to the agreement, and that "by their actions, the Taliban have ended over four months of peace in Musa Qala which, until now, had seen a return to normality with reconstruction and development getting under way."
"It is very clear that the Taliban are acting against the wishes of the people of Musa Qala," a NATO statement said.
Richards, a strong supporter of the British-backed peace agreement, said the Taliban move proved the agreement's success.
"These mechanisms to drive a wedge are an absolute classic part of any counterinsurgency," he said. "Far from being a failure, it shows what a success this can be and how upsetting it can be to the Taliban."
‘IN A DIFFERENT PLACE’: The envoy first visited Shanghai, where he attended a Chinese basketball playoff match, and is to meet top officials in Beijing tomorrow US Secretary of State Antony Blinken yesterday arrived in China on his second visit in a year as the US ramps up pressure on its rival over its support for Russia while also seeking to manage tensions with Beijing. The US diplomat tomorrow is to meet China’s top brass in Beijing, where he is also expected to plead for restraint as Taiwan inaugurates president-elect William Lai (賴清德), and to raise US concerns on Chinese trade practices. However, Blinken is also seeking to stabilize ties, with tensions between the world’s two largest economies easing since his previous visit in June last year. At the
UNSETTLING IMAGES: The scene took place in front of TV crews covering the Trump trial, with a CNN anchor calling it an ‘emotional and unbelievably disturbing moment’ A man who doused himself in an accelerant and set himself on fire outside the courthouse where former US president Donald Trump is on trial has died, police said yesterday. The New York City Police Department (NYPD) said the man was declared dead by staff at an area hospital. The man was in Collect Pond Park at about 1:30pm on Friday when he took out pamphlets espousing conspiracy theories, tossed them around, then doused himself in an accelerant and set himself on fire, officials and witnesses said. A large number of police officers were nearby when it happened. Some officers and bystanders rushed
Beijing is continuing to commit genocide and crimes against humanity against Uyghurs and other Muslim minorities in its western Xinjiang province, U.S. Secretary of State Antony Blinken said in a report published on Monday, ahead of his planned visit to China this week. The State Department’s annual human rights report, which documents abuses recorded all over the world during the previous calendar year, repeated language from previous years on the treatment of Muslims in Xinjiang, but the publication raises the issue ahead of delicate talks, including on the war in Ukraine and global trade, between the top U.S. diplomat and Chinese
RIVER TRAGEDY: Local fishers and residents helped rescue people after the vessel capsized, while motorbike taxis evacuated some of the injured At least 58 people going to a funeral died after their overloaded river boat capsized in the Central African Republic’s (CAR) capital, Bangui, the head of civil protection said on Saturday. “We were able to extract 58 lifeless bodies,” Thomas Djimasse told Radio Guira. “We don’t know the total number of people who are underwater. According to witnesses and videos on social media, the wooden boat was carrying more than 300 people — some standing and others perched on wooden structures — when it sank on the Mpoko River on Friday. The vessel was heading to the funeral of a village chief in