Now Baku wants to turn the fabled fortress town into a resort. The South Asia Channel Diversionary Tactics The Taliban's offensive in Kunduz province is a diversion that will serve to distract the Afghan army away from the real goal -- Helmand province.
Chris Mason. Afghan troops prepare to board a helicopter in Kunduz on April 30, Intense fighting flared in northern Afghanistan as security forces battled Taliban insurgents advancing on April 28 on a major provincial capital, officials said, with terrified residents fearing the fall of the besieged city.
Hundreds of militants closed in on Kunduz city after attacking outlying police and army checkposts on April 24, just hours after the Taliban launched their annual spring offensive. May 5, , AM. Army War College in Carlisle, Pennsylvania. November 11, , PM. Blame Brussels. Trending 1. Fiona Hill: U. But the battle continues and Afghan officials concede it will be slow, bloody work to dislodge the insurgents much further. In the meantime, the region's Civillian population will bear the brunt of living on Afghanistan's new northern front line.
Already more than , people have been forced from their homes, many renting houses or staying with other families and receiving assistance from UN agencies and other charities. The presence of Civillians across the battle zone is one of the main factors hindering the tactics and progress of government forces.
Officials say that army operations are hampered not only by poor equipment and lack of air support, but by the presence of the militants in people's homes, and fears that fighting in rural districts could set fire to the wheat crop now ready for harvest. A total of war-wounded were admitted to Kunduz's only trauma hospital, run by French NGO Medecins Sans Frontieres, between April 24, when the assault kicked off the Taliban's annual warm-weather offensive, and May 11, said project coordinator Laurent Gabriel.
Seventeen-year-old Nasrullah was walking home from school on May 17 when he was caught in crossfire in the Iman Sahib district north of the city — scene of some of the worst fighting. He took three bullets in his left leg — now pinned and hoisted — and one in his right leg. In the opposite bed, year-old policeman Abdullah Raouf is recovering from a May 19 mortar attack in Gor Tepa.
Still dazed from surgery, he was unable to talk as two male relatives said both legs and his right shoulder were wounded. In areas returned to government control, a tense and uncertain peace prevails. The militias in mufti outnumber the army. Military Humvees and armored police vehicles come and go sporadically, and soldiers sit in watchtowers reinforced with dirt-filled Hesco bags.
In the fields, the wheat is cut into sheaves, and the occasional shop opens for the residents who are tentatively making a return to their damaged homes. Residents of villages like Talawka, with 4, households and just a few kilometres from the front line at Gor Tepa, are not taking their shaky moment of respite for granted. Local militia groups were drafted for the front-line fight, some of them armed and paid by the provincial authorities.
Now they patrol the cleared areas, walking in single file along the mud-brick walls of deserted compounds and through the shimmering wheat fields — their automatic rifles, grenade launchers and machine guns slung over baggy cotton shalwar khameez. Mohammad Aslam welcomes the militiamen into his compound in Al-Chin, which he shared with the families of his five brothers until they found themselves on the front line of the newest war.
Half the family compound was destroyed and most of the 40 residents fled. He remains with a couple of his young sons to tend the cows and donkeys tethered under a tree, and the chickens and ducks with their newly-hatched broods.
Now as he kicks the charred bricks and wood of a brother's house, Aslam worries that it will be a long time before lasting peace is assured. In this Thursday, May 21, photo, an Afghan refugee girl walks with her goat at a camp on the outskirts of Kunduz province, north of Kabul, Afghanistan. We welcome your comments. According to local sources, he was killed in an airstrike in Soon after, Qari Basher Madani — a young madrasa-educated Uzbek from Kunduz — was appointed as his successor.
Later, Qari Basher, along with a few other local commanders such as Ghulam Hazrat alias Huzaifa and Abu Shahid, fled to Pakistan to escape airstrikes and night raids conducted in the area. A year later, they became more active and influential in the district. They managed to swiftly gather more local IMU commanders to join them and, as a result, were able to expand their network over the entire province as well as in neighbouring Baghlan and Takhar. Local sources confirmed that the assault on Chahrdara district centre in June , which resulted in its fall to the Taleban, was organised by Jundullah fighters.
Jundullah initially intended to remain independent from the Taleban, an issue that has often generated tensions between the two groups. Pre-existing tensions between the two further increased after Jundullah followers were targeted by airstrikes in Kunduz in see here. It was also initially unclear as to whether the group continued to maintain ties with the IMU, with whom they were sympathetic due to ethnic ties. After several meetings with Jundullah commanders in Chahrdara, the head of the group, Haji Basher Madani, and Huzaifa were finally talked into taking part in a Taleban gathering in the district on 25 August , in order to pledge their support to Akhtar.
Haji Basher presented his terms and conditions for supporting Mansur in a short speech. That same evening, Huzaifa, along with other Jundullah commanders, were killed in a US airstrike in Kunduz read here. This renewed the distrust between the two groups, as Jundullah supporters accused the Taleban of spying for Afghan government intelligence and hence being responsible for the death of prominent Jundullah commanders.
After this attack, many Jundullah commanders left for Borqa district of Baghlan province and Eshkamish district of Takhar province, where the group has larger areas under their control. Reportedly, only Abu Shahid, an Uzbek from Kunduz, along with a few dozen supporters, have remained in Chahrdara district. The group has tried to avoid risking an open confrontation with the Taleban.
Chahrdara was not the only district in trouble long before the attack on Kunduz city. Since then, the district has become another stronghold for the insurgents in Kunduz province. There, according to locals, the Taleban have established military training camps, which are visited frequently by insurgent military commanders from other parts of Afghanistan and also occasionally from Central Asia.
The fact that Archi has become such a hub for the Taleban is no coincidence, as the district is the homeland of the provincial shadow governor of Kunduz, Mullah Salam Baryalai — the man suspected of orchestrating the attack on Kunduz city in September last year. In February , Mullah Salam was arrested in Pakistan, where he was kept in detention for over two years read a short report here.
Upon his return to Kunduz in , however, Mullah Salam resumed his role as the head of the Taleban for the province. Given the strong Taleban control of Archi district, it was also slated for an operation to eliminate their stronghold there after the recapture of Kunduz city.
From Tank-e Sokhta, they then staged their attack to re-take the district centre. Within 24 hours, they managed to push the Taleban back and bring parts of the district centre under their control. The Special Forces, however, were not able to maintain control of the district centre for long. The insurgents managed to push the ANSF back out of some parts of the district centre. After months of fierce fighting, the district centre of Archi remains the frontline today.
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