Joseph Goldstein and Taimoor Shah
June 19, 2015
Taliban Strike Crucial District in Afghanistan
KABUL, Afghanistan — Taliban fighters overran part of a crucial district in the southern province of Helmand early Thursday, residents of the area said, demonstrating the insurgents’ growing power in an area that American and British troops had long fought to keep out of Taliban control.
During a nighttime assault that lasted into early Thursday, Taliban fighters sacked part of the center of Musa Qala District, according to the residents, setting a clinic on fire and destroying government vehicles parked at a major police station.
Omar Zwak, a spokesman for the governor of Helmand Province, said that the Taliban never succeeded in overrunning the area but acknowledged that they had entered the district center and set fire to buildings and police vehicles. But some residents said that the Taliban controlled much of the district center early Thursday, at least temporarily.
Musa Qala, in the northern part of Helmand Province, is an important source of the opium poppy that provides revenue for the insurgency. While the Taliban have long been active in the Musa Qala countryside, insurgents had last seized control of the district center in 2007, after besieged British troops withdrew from the town.
NATO and Afghan forces took back the district center later that year. By May 2014, when the last American Marines withdrew from the north of Helmand Province, American commanders declared the region largely pacified after years of hard fighting.
But since then, Musa Qala and three neighboring districts have been plunged into violence as the Taliban quickly strengthened their hold over northern Helmand. The Taliban have long exercised uncontested control over Helmand’s northernmost district, Baghran. But over the past year, it has seized a belt of territory south of Baghran that extends across Helmand and into Oruzgan and Kandahar to the east.
In recent days, the Taliban began a series of attacks against police outposts outside several district centers in northern Helmand. Last week, insurgentsseized a police base about a mile from the district center of Musa Qala, killing 17 of the 19 police officers stationed there.
In neighboring Sangin District, the Taliban have seized at least three guard posts from the police this week, an Afghan intelligence official said, speaking on the condition of anonymity.
The official said that government forces were bracing for the Taliban to attack Kajaki District, which is nearby. The Taliban already control most of the district and have the center encircled and cut off from supplies.
But the Taliban’s recent gains in Helmand, a traditional stronghold for the group, have been somewhat overshadowed by their advances in the north ofAfghanistan, which took the government in Kabul by surprise.
Since April, when the Taliban announced the start of its annual spring offensive, the Taliban have threatened Kunduz, an important city not far from the border with Tajikistan. Insurgents also seized a remote district center in the mountainous province of Badakhshan this month, which it has held for more than 10 days, despite several efforts by government forces to retake it.
Even so, the Taliban’s most significant gains this year appear to have occurred in the south, in Helmand and Oruzgan.
The attack on Musa Qala began after midnight and lasted until Thursday morning. Mr. Zwak, the spokesman for the Helmand governor, said that at least two police officers had been killed in the fighting, although some residents said the number of casualties was higher.
“The Taliban seized the bazaar, and in the morning they left it,” said Abdullah Motmain, a resident and shopkeeper, referring to an area with several hundred shops and stalls. But he said the damage to the bazaar was minimal, despite two shops catching on fire in the night
By morning, the Taliban had withdrawn and two Afghan Army helicopters flew over the area, Mr. Motmain said, with reinforcements arriving soon after.
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