A wave of attacks killed six US troops and at least a dozen civilians in Afghanistan’s volatile south and east, as US reinforcements moving into Taliban-dominated areas face up to the fierce resistance they expected.
Increased US-led military operations in the southern province of Kandahar are aimed at trying to break the Taliban’s grip where they are strongest by delivering security and government services to win over Afghan people.
PHOTO: EPA
The hope is once the tide begins to turn, more control can be handed to Afghan forces without fear the Taliban might again seize power, bring back its harsh interpretation of Islamic law and resume sheltering al-Qaeda terrorist leaders. Then US troops could begin withdrawing next July, in line with a timeline set by US President Barack Obama.
Senior US military officers have warned, however, the fight in the Taliban’s spiritual birthplace would lead to a rise in casualties for troops. Last month was the deadliest month of the nearly nine-year-old war, and this month has kept pace.
On Saturday, two US troops died in the south in separate roadside bombings. In Kandahar city, a remote-controlled bomb on a motorcycle exploded, setting cars ablaze and shattering windows at a popular shopping center. The provincial government said one passer-by was also killed.
Other US service members died in the east: One as a result of small-arms fire, another by a roadside bomb, a third during an insurgent attack and the last in an accidental explosion.
Their deaths raised to 23 the number of US troops killed so far this month. Last month, 103 international troops died, 60 of them from the US.
In Saturday’s deadliest attack, eastern border province of Paktia, unidentified gunmen killed 11 Pakistanis who had crossed into Afghanistan to buy supplies, according to Rohullah Samon, spokesman for the provincial governor.
Samon said 11 Shiite minority Muslim tribesmen died and three people, including a child, were wounded in the ambush of their minibus in Chamkani district.
In other developments, a district governor and 11 policemen have been killed in Taliban attacks, authorities said yesterday.
Six border police officers were killed when rebels stormed their post on the Tajikistan border in Kunduz Province late on Saturday, local official Mohammad Ayoub said.
The attack was “facilitated by two policemen linked to the Taliban,” he said.
In neighboring Qala-i-Zal district, rebels killed the district chief on Saturday using a remote-controlled bomb, a local government spokesman said.
In the remote northeastern province of Badakhshan, another Taliban bomb on Saturday killed five police officers while on patrol, the interior ministry said in a separate statement.
SPEAKING OUT: After Siranudh Scott’s allegations surfaced, celebrities and public figures took to social media to share their own experiences of sexual misconduct and abuse A high-profile alleged sexual abuse case within a wealthy Thai beer brewing family has prompted a wave of painful accounts from survivors of unconnected abuse in the conservative nation. Siranudh Scott, a member of the billionaire Thai family that founded the ubiquitous Singha beer brand, posted an emotional video this month accusing his elder brother Sunit of repeatedly abusing him when he was a teenager. Sunit, who is in his 30s, later denied the allegations in a video posted online, but Singha parent Boonrawd dismissed him from his executive role with the company on Tuesday last week. “I felt I needed to speak
A Hong Kong astronaut is to join a Chinese space mission for the first time as part of a three-person crew launching today, as Beijing edges closer to its goal of landing people on the moon. The Tiangong space station — crewed by teams of three astronauts that are typically rotated every six months — is the crown jewel of China’s space program, boosted by billions in state investment in a bid to catch up with the US and Russia. The Shenzhou-23 mission is to blast off at 11:08pm from the Jiuquan Satellite Launch Center in northwestern China, carrying three astronauts to
UPGRADED ALERT: The risk inside DR Congo is now considered ‘very high,’ while neighboring countries face a ‘high’ threat as the outbreak continues, the WHO said Ebola is spreading faster than responders can track it in eastern Congo, where health workers managed to follow up with barely one in five identified contacts in a single day. Authorities in the Democratic Republic of the Congo (DR Congo) reported 83 confirmed infections, 746 suspected cases and 1,603 identified contacts as of Thursday, but health workers were able to follow up on only 342 contacts that day — about 21 percent of the total under monitoring — data released by the DR Congo Ministry of Public Health on Friday showed. The figures suggest the response is falling behind the outbreak itself,
SEEKING ORDER: Rodrigo Paz said that ‘anyone who wants to destroy the nation will have to deal with this president and the full force of the constitution’ Bolivian President Rodrigo Paz on Wednesday said that the nation was at a “breaking point” after nearly a month of protests that have caused shortages of food, fuel and medicine. Paz, who took office six months ago amid the worst economic crisis there in four decades, is battling a groundswell of fury over his policies. The political capital, La Paz, has been besieged by low-income workers and members of the indigenous majority calling for his resignation. “The country needs order and is reaching breaking point,” the 58-year-old said at a public event in La Paz, renewing his appeal for dialogue. On Tuesday, the Bolivian
RSS