Tag Archives: Afghanistan

Exclusive: Islamic State crushes rebellion plot in Mosul as army closes in

Convoy on the Outskirts of Mosul

By Ahmed Rasheed

BAGHDAD (Reuters) – Islamic State has crushed a rebellion plot in Mosul, led by one of the group’s commanders who aimed to switch sides and help deliver the caliphate’s Iraqi capital to government forces, residents and Iraqi security officials said.

Islamic State (IS) executed 58 people suspected of taking part in the plot after it was uncovered last week. Residents, who spoke to Reuters from some of the few locations in the city that have phone service, said the plotters were killed by drowning and their bodies were buried in a mass grave in a wasteland on the outskirts of the city.

Among them was a local aide of IS leader Abu Bakr al-Baghdadi, who led the plotters, according to matching accounts given by five residents, by Hisham al-Hashimi, an expert on IS affairs that advises the government in Baghdad and by colonel Ahmed al-Taie, from Mosul’s Nineveh province Operation Command’s military intelligence.

Reuters is not publishing the name of the plot leader to avoid increasing the safety risk for his family, nor the identities of those inside the city who spoke about the plot.

The aim of the plotters was to undermine Islamic State’s defense of Mosul in the upcoming fight, expected to be the biggest battle in Iraq since the 2003 U.S.-led invasion.

Mosul is the last major stronghold of Islamic State in Iraq. With a pre-war population of around 2 million, it is at least five times the size of any other city Islamic State has controlled. Iraqi officials say a massive ground assault could begin this month, backed by U.S. air power, Kurdish security forces and Shi’ite and Sunni irregular units.

A successful offensive would effectively destroy the Iraqi half of the caliphate that the group declared when it swept through northern Iraq in 2014. But the United Nations says it could also create the biggest humanitarian crisis in the world, in a worst case scenario uprooting 1 million people.

Islamic State fighters are dug in to defend the city, and have a history of using civilians as human shields when defending territory.

CAUGHT

According to Hashimi, the dissidents were arrested after one of them was caught with a message on his phone mentioning a transfer of weapons. He confessed during interrogation that weapons were being hidden in three locations, to be used in a rebellion to support the Iraqi army when it closes in on Mosul.

IS raided the three houses used to hide the weapons on Oct. 4, Hashimi said.

“Those were Daesh members who turned against the group in Mosul,” said Iraqi Counter-terrorism Service spokesman Sabah al-Numani in Baghdad, using an Arabic acronym for Islamic State. “This is a clear sign that the terrorist organization has started to lose support not only from the population, but even from its own members.”

A spokesman for the U.S.-led military coalition which conducts air strikes on Islamic State targets in Syria and Iraq was unable to confirm or deny the accounts of the thwarted plot.

Signs of cracks inside the “caliphate” appeared this year as the ultra-hardline Sunni group was forced out of half the territory it overran two years ago in northern and western Iraq.

Some people in Mosul have been expressing their refusal of IS’s harsh rules by spray-painting the letter M, for the Arabic word that means resistance, on city walls, or “wanted” on houses of its militants. Such activity is punished by death.

Numani said his service has succeeded in the past two months in opening contact channels with “operatives” who began communicating intelligence that helped conduct air strikes on the insurgents’ command centers and locations in Mosul.

A list with the names of the 58 executed plotters was given to a hospital to inform their families but their bodies were not returned, the residents said.

“Some of the executed relatives sent old women to ask about the bodies. Daesh rebuked them and told them no bodies, no graves, those traitors are apostates and it is forbidden to bury them in Muslim cemeteries,” said one resident whose relative was among those executed.

“After the failed coup, Daesh withdrew the special identity cards it issued for its local commanders, to prevent them from fleeing Mosul with their families,” Colonel al-Taie said.

A Mosul resident said Islamic State had appointed a new official, Muhsin Abdul Kareem Oghlu, a leader of a sniper unit with a reputation as a die-hard, to assist its governor of Mosul, Ahmed Khalaf Agab al-Jabouri, in keeping control.

Islamic State militants have placed booby traps across the city of Mosul, dug tunnels and recruited children as spies in anticipation of the offensive.

(Writing by Maher Chmaytelli; editing by Peter Graff)

Islamic State claims responsibility for deadly mosque attack in Afghan capital

Afghan Shi'ite Muslims carry the coffin of one of the victims of Tuesday's attack for burial at the Sakhi Shrine in Kabul, Afghanistan

KABUL (Reuters) – Islamic State on Wednesday claimed responsibility for an attack that killed at least 18 worshippers at a shrine in the Afghan capital, raising fears of sectarian violence after a string of attacks on the country’s Shi’ite minority.

The claim of responsibility for Tuesday’s attack, released online, came as the minority gathered to observe Ashura, one of its holiest days, in commemorations subdued because of security fears, as well as the funerals of the dead.

On Wednesday afternoon, a second explosion outside a mosque in northern Afghanistan killed at least 14 people and wounded 24 at a similar Ashura gathering. But there was no immediate claim of responsibility for that blast.

Islamic State also targeted members of Kabul’s Shi’ite community in a suicide bombing in July that killed more than 80 people and wounded 130.

The attacker in Kabul, said to be wearing a police uniform, entered the Karte Shakhi mosque on Tuesday night and opened fire on a crowd of Shi’ite Muslims gathered for Ashura, which marks the seventh-century death of a grandson of the prophet Mohammed.

In its statement, Islamic State said the attacker detonated a suicide vest after firing all his ammunition, but security forces said they shot the man.

A Reuters video shows the suspected attacker’s body intact, with no sign of an explosive vest.

The dead included four women and two children, said the United Nations, which condemned the attack as an “atrocity”.

It put the tally at 18 civilians killed and 50 wounded, though some witnesses said the toll could be higher.

Mourners buried several of the victims, including a four-year-old girl, on Wednesday.

“We are not happy with the government and the police. They both failed to protect us and provide security for us,” said one of the girl’s relatives, Mohammed Hussain, who described the event as “doomsday” for the family.

The day is typically marked by processions that often include self-flagellation by some worshippers, but government warnings of possible attacks prompted more subdued observation of the event this year.

The Taliban, who have been waging a 15-year insurgency against the Western-backed government and often conduct attacks in Kabul, had denied involvement in the shooting.

The schism between Sunnis and Shi’ites developed after the prophet Mohammed died in 632 and his followers could not agree on a successor. Some Sunni Muslim militants see Shi’ites as a threat and legitimate targets for attack.

(Reporting by Mirwais Harooni; Writing by Josh Smith; Editing by Robert Birsel and Clarence Fernandez)

U.N. – situation ‘rapidly deteriorating’ in embattled Afghan city

Afghan security forces keep watch in front of their armoured vehicle in Kunduz city, Afghanistan

KUNDUZ, Afghanistan (Reuters) – Fighting in the northern Afghan city of Kunduz has led to a “rapidly deteriorating” humanitarian situation, officials said on Thursday, leaving thousands of people with limited access to food, water, or medical care.

Street-to-street gun battles have continued for four days after Taliban militants slipped past the city’s defenses on Monday.

Government troops, backed by U.S. special forces and air strikes, have repeatedly declared that they are in control of the city, but residents report that heavy fighting has forced many people to flee.

The fighting has forced as many as 10,000 people from their homes in Kunduz, the United Nations reported, with those who remain facing serious water, food and electricity shortages, as well as threats from the fighting.

“Many families were unable to bring their possessions with them and are in a precarious position,” Dominic Parker, head of the U.N.’s humanitarian coordination office, said in a statement. “We have had reports that some families have been forced to sleep out in the open and many have few food supplies.”

Among those fleeing Kunduz are about two-thirds of the staff at the city’s main public hospital, which was struck by several rockets and small arms fire, said Marzia Yaftali Salaam, a doctor.

The 200-bed public hospital is the main provider of medical care in Kunduz after a more advanced trauma center run by Medecins Sans Frontieres was destroyed by an American air strike last year.

In the past three days, the hospital has been inundated by at least 210 patients, many of them civilians, including women and children, wounded in the fighting, Salaam said.

“Many of the wounded had to be carried to clinics in surrounding districts and private clinics in the city,” she said. “If the situation remains the same, we may be forced to halt our services.”

During a lull in the fighting on Wednesday, nearly 50 casualties were rushed to the hospital in the span of a few hours, said Hameed Alam, head of the public health department in Kunduz.

The U.S. military command in Kabul said Afghan forces are “defeating Taliban attempts to take Kunduz,” with reinforcements on the way and commandos continuing to clear “isolated pockets” of Taliban fighters.

The Taliban, who ruled Afghanistan with an iron fist from 1996 to 2001, are seeking to topple the Western-backed government in Kabul and reimpose Islamic rule.

“There is fighting in every street and the situation is critical,” said Ismail Kawasi, a spokesman for the Public Health Ministry in Kabul.

Additional medical supplies and personnel were positioned in neighboring provinces, but they must wait for the fighting to subside before they can be flown to Kunduz, he said.

(Reporting by Sardar Razmal; Additional reporting by Mirwais Harooni in Kabul; Writing by Josh Smith; Editing by Nick Macfie and Dominic Evans)

Residents flee as Afghan troops battle Taliban in city of Kunduz

Afghan security forces fight Taliban

KABUL (Reuters) – Thousands of residents have fled or face deteriorating conditions as fighting between Afghan forces and Taliban militants entered its third day in the embattled northern city of Kunduz, officials said on Wednesday.

Taliban fighters easily penetrated the city’s defenses on Monday, raising questions about the capacity of the Western-backed security forces, even as international donors meet in Brussels to approve billions of dollars in new development aid for Afghanistan.

“Most civilians have abandoned Kunduz city and have gone to neighboring districts or provinces,” said Kunduz provincial governor Asadullah Amarkhel. “There is no electricity, no water and no food. Many shops are closed.”

Government troops, backed by U.S. special forces and air strikes, have made slow but “significant” progress in clearing the city, said Kunduz police chief Qasim Jangalbagh.

He acknowledged, however, that the situation remained dangerous for many residents.

“There are security problems in the city,” he said. “People do not have enough food, water and other needs so they are evacuating the city to go to safe places.”

In social media posts, the Taliban rejected claims that the government had retaken Kunduz and accused security forces and U.S. troops of committing abuses against civilians.

The U.S. military command in Kabul said there was “sporadic” fighting within Kunduz but Afghan security forces controlled the city.

American aircraft conducted at least two air strikes on Wednesday to “defend friendly forces who were receiving enemy fire”, the military said in a statement online.

“The city is locked down,” said Hajji Hasem, a resident leaving Kunduz with his family on Wednesday. “If the Taliban and air strikes do not kill you, hunger and thirst will.”

Increased attacks by insurgents hoping to topple the Western-backed government and install Islamist rule have tested the Afghan security forces who are struggling to defend major cities and roads a year and a half after a NATO-led force declared an end to its combat mission.

The violence has displaced nearly 1 million Afghans within the country, according to the United Nations, and contributed to an exodus of tens of thousands to Europe and other areas.

The two-day, EU-led donor conference in Brussels is seeking fresh funds despite Western public fatigue with involvement in Afghanistan, 15 years after the U.S. invasion that ousted the Taliban weeks after the Sept. 11, 2001, attacks on the United States.

(Reporting by Afghanistan bureau; Writing by Josh Smith; Editing by Robert Birsel)

Afghan refugees in Pakistan feel heat of rising regional tensions

Afghan women sit with their children after arriving at a United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees

By James Mackenzie and Mirwais Harooni

KABUL (Reuters) – For Samihullah, a tailor from a family of Afghan refugees in Pakistan, the first indication that it might be time to leave the country was the insults leveled at him in the bazaar.

Born to refugee parents in the northern Pakistani town of Mansehra, he never gained citizenship but was always considered an Afghan, something which began to count against him as local resentment grew over Afghanistan’s deepening ties with India.

Many Pakistanis view India as their enemy at the best of times, and that attitude has hardened in recent months as tensions between the nuclear-armed rivals have risen.

“Afghans used to be called ‘Kabuli’ in Pakistan, but now Pakistanis call them ‘Hindus’ because we signed economic agreements with India,” said Samihullah, who, like many Afghans, goes by one name.

Married with two wives, one Afghan and one Pakistani, the 32-year-old is among thousands of people who have gone to Afghanistan and are housed temporarily in a refugee center near Kabul.

Even before the latest clashes between Indian and Pakistani soldiers in the disputed Kashmir region, the climate was more hostile.

“They were telling us, we chose India’s friendship so we should go to India. We were hiding in our shops and homes to avoid being arrested,” Samihullah said.

After almost 40 years of war in Afghanistan, Pakistan has some 1.5 million registered refugees, one of the largest such populations in the world, according to the United Nations refugee agency. More than a million others are estimated to live there unregistered.

Islamabad, which announced new repatriation plans last year, has stepped up pressure to send people back and numbers have risen sharply in recent months as Afghan-Indian relations strengthened and those between India and Pakistan soured.

“These people were our guests, we kept them in our house. Afghanistan should be grateful to us,” said a Pakistani army official based in the southern city of Quetta.

“Instead it … has become buddies with India, it’s like stabbing us in the back.”

The treatment Samihullah and others at the reception center complain of reflects how quickly diplomatic tensions can affect refugees, many of whom must start again from scratch.

“These returnees are coming back after more than three decades in exile,” said Maya Ameratunga, director of UNHCR’s Country office in Kabul. “It will take a big adjustment.”

The United Nations provides $400 a person in emergency help as well as medical and other assistance, but international funds are drying up in the face of a series of global crises.

Longer term reintegration into a country many never knew as home may be difficult.

“Some people are able to go to live with relatives, but others may not have that possibility. So unfortunately what we are seeing is people becoming displaced,” Ameratunga said.

“HONOR AND DIGNITY”

Ties between Afghanistan and Pakistan have long been clouded by mutual accusations that militant extremists find shelter on the other side of the border.

But Pakistani officials deny there has been systematic harassment of Afghans living in Pakistan and say their country has demonstrated great generosity to the refugee population, despite severe economic problems of its own.

“We want them to return home in peace with honor and dignity,” said Akhtar Munir, spokesman at the Pakistani embassy in Kabul, adding that there was no connection between the repatriation of Afghan refugees and India.

He said Pakistani police had clear instructions not to harass registered refugees, but added that some Afghans living illegally in Pakistan were involved in crime, and action against criminals should not be seen as mistreatment of refugees.

The spike in the number of returnees has, however, moved in step with escalating friction between Afghanistan and Pakistan, which flared into brief clashes at the Torkham border crossing in June.

A series of economic and political accords with India in recent months and the fanfare around the completion of the Indian-financed Salma dam in western Afghanistan in June has also weighed on relations.

According to UNHCR figures, the number of assisted returns jumped from 1,433 in June to 11,416 in July and 60,743 in August. More than 90,000 have been returned to Afghanistan so far this year, almost all from Pakistan, and the number is expected to pass 220,000 for the year.

Although repatriation is not compulsory, many Afghans say life in Pakistan has become so uncomfortable they feel they have little choice.

Even in areas like Baluchistan in the south, where authorities have long taken a more lenient view of refugees than in the northwest frontier areas, attitudes have changed, particularly in the wake of recent attacks.

“My son was stopped at a checkpoint and an officer tore up his Afghan citizenship card,” said Bibi Shireen, who moved to Quetta from the southern Afghan city of Kandahar 30 years ago.

“Now he has no identification and we’re scared he could get picked up any day now and sent away because he isn’t registered,” she said.

Previously, Afghan refugees did not need visas or passports to cross the porous frontier. This has now changed, a step Pakistan says is needed to ensure control of militant extremists on both sides of the border.

Despite the problems, many returnees say they are not unhappy to be back, though they need help with food and shelter as harsh winter months approach.

“We did our best over the past 20 years but could not make a living,” said Sheer Banu Ahmadzai, a burqa-veiled mother who left her home in the northern province of Baghlan as a child. “I hope we have the chance to make a living in our own country.”

(Additional reporting by Mehreen Zahra-Malik in QUETTA; Editing by Mike Collett-White)

Suicide bombers hit Shi’ite gatherings in Baghdad, at least 11 dead: police

Member of Si

BAGHDAD (Reuters) – Suicide bombers attacked two Shi’ite Muslim processions in Baghdad on Monday, killing at least 11 people and wounding more than 40, police and medical sources said.

Islamic State claimed responsibility for the blasts at the Shi’ite events commemorating the slaying of Prophet Mohammad’s grandson Hussein.

A bomber detonated his explosive vest in the middle of one Shi’ite procession in the Amil district of southern Baghdad, killing six and wounding 25, the sources said.

A similar attack hit a procession in the eastern Mashtal district, killing five and wounding 18, the sources added.

(Reporting by Karem Raheem and Ahmed Rasheed; Writing by Maher Chmaytelli; Editing by Andrew Heavens)

U.S. probing Afghan-born bomber’s motive, foreign travel

A still image captured from a video from WABC television shows a conscious man believed to be New York bombing suspect Ahmad Khan Rahami being loaded into an ambulance after a shoot-out with police in New Jersey

By Joseph Ax and Mica Rosenberg

LINDEN, N.J. (Reuters) – U.S. investigators were looking on Tuesday for clues to why an Afghanistan-born man might have planted bombs around the New York area over the weekend, including whether the suspect had accomplices or was radicalized overseas.

Ahmad Khan Rahami, 28, was arrested on Monday in Linden, New Jersey, after a gun battle with police. They were summoned by a neighborhood bar owner who thought the bearded man sleeping against his closed tavern’s front door in pouring rain resembled the bombing suspect.

Rahami and two police officers were wounded in the exchange of gunfire.

The events put New York on edge and fueled the debate about U.S. security seven weeks before the presidential election, with candidates Donald Trump and Hillary Clinton clashing once again on Monday.

Rahami was suspected of a spate of weekend bombings, including a blast in New York’s crowded Chelsea neighborhood that wounded 29 people, and two in suburban New Jersey that caused no injuries.

He lived with his family above the First American Fried Chicken restaurant in Elizabeth, New Jersey.

The suspect’s foreign trips were coming under scrutiny, with U.S. media reporting that he had traveled to Pakistan and his native Afghanistan multiple times. Police were looking into whether he was radicalized during that time.

U.S. security sources have confirmed that Rahami underwent secondary screening after returning from foreign travel in recent years and passed on every occasion.

Travelers coming from Afghanistan and Pakistan, which both have a strong Taliban presence, are routinely required to undergo secondary screening.

“There could have been a more intensive holding and screening in that situation,” U.S. Senator Angus King, an independent from Maine, told CNN. “The problem is what happened next didn’t really go into any depth.”

Rahami’s wife left the United States a few days before the bombings, CNN reported on Tuesday, citing a law enforcement source.

‘ACT OF TERROR’

Authorities did not offer any immediate information on the possible motives of Rahami, whom Union County prosecutors charged with five counts of attempted murder in the first degree and two second-degree weapons charges.

He was in critical but stable condition as a result of his wounds, and police had not yet been able to interview him in depth, New York Police Department Commissioner James O’Neill said on Tuesday.

O’Neill, who was sworn in as commissioner on Monday, said he was encouraged that officers found Rahami hiding alone.

“It’s a good sign that we found him in a doorway,” O’Neill told CBS “This Morning.” “Hopefully that means he had nowhere to go.”

More charges were expected to be brought against Rahami in federal court. New York City Mayor Bill de Blasio called the Saturday night bombing “an act of terror.”

Rahami is also suspected of planting a bomb that exploded on the New Jersey shore on Saturday, a device found near the New York blast, and up to six more devices found near the Elizabeth train station on Sunday night.

All of the people injured in Saturday night’s blast have been released from hospitals.The bombings and subsequent manhunt prompted even greater security in New York. The largest U.S. city was already on high alert for a gathering of world leaders at the United Nations in New York for the annual General Assembly this week. An additional 1,000 officers were deployed.

The blasts, the manhunt and an apparently unrelated stabbing attack in Minnesota over the weekend created tensions similar to those that followed other recent attacks, such as the mass shootings in Orlando and San Bernardino, California.

The Minnesota attacker was described a “soldier of the Islamic State,” the militant group’s news agency said.

Rahami had not previously been identified as dangerous, but Elizabeth police knew of his family because of late-night noise and crowd complaints at its halal chicken restaurant.

(Additional reporting by Mark Hosenball, Julia Edwards, Susan Heavey and Doina Chiacu in Washington; Roberta Rampton, Hilary Russ and Daniel Trotta in New York, Roselle Chen in Linden, New Jersey, Brendan O’Brien in Milwaukee and Dan Whitcomb in Los Angeles.; Writing by Scott Malone; Editing by Lisa Von Ahn)

Gunmen attack American university in Kabul, students flee

A wounded man lies inside an ambulance following an attack at American University of Afghanistan in Kabul, Afghanistan

By Hamid Shalizi

KABUL (Reuters) – Suspected militants stormed the Kabul campus of the American University of Afghanistan on Wednesday with some students jumping from second floor windows to escape the gunfire and explosions, witnesses and officials said.

Foreign staff and dozens of pupils were trapped in the compound hours after the attack began at about 6:30 p.m. (10 a.m. ET).

News of casualties was sketchy, but the head of hospitals in the Afghan capital said at least one person had been killed and 14 students wounded in the assault.

“Many students jumped from the second floor, some broke their legs and some hurt their head trying to escape,” Abdullah Fahimi, a student who escaped, told Reuters. He injured his ankle making the leap.

“We were in the class when we heard a loud explosion followed by gunfire. It was very close. Some students were crying, others were screaming.”

A senior interior ministry official said that elite Afghan forces had surrounded the university and witnesses at the scene said special forces had entered the walled compound where gunfire that had lasted for more than an hour had since stopped.

“There are two gunmen hiding inside the building and a clearing operation is ongoing to eliminate them,” interior ministry spokesman, Sediq Sediqqi, said.

CAR BOMB

Ahmad Mukhtar, another student who fled the scene, said the gunmen had got into the university buildings despite security measures including three or four armed guards and watchtowers.

He added that he believed the attack had started at the main gate into the compound.

“I finished my class and was about to leave when I heard a few gunshots and a huge explosion, followed by more gunfire,” he said. “I ran toward the emergency exit with other students, climbed the wall and jumped outside.”

Kabul police chief, Abdul Rahman Rahimi, told Reuters that the attack began with a car bomb and several attackers had entered the campus.

Islamist militant groups, mainly the Afghan Taliban and a local offshoot of Islamic State, have claimed a string of recent atrocities aimed at destabilizing the country and toppling the Western-backed government of President Ashraf Ghani.

No one has claimed the university attack.

It is the second time this month that the university or its staff have been targeted.

Two teachers, an American and an Australian, remain missing after being abducted at gunpoint from a road nearby on Aug. 7.

Taliban insurgents control large swathes of Afghanistan, and local armed forces are struggling to contain them, especially in the provinces of Helmand to the south and Kunduz to the north.

NATO ended its combat mission in December 2014, but thousands of troops remain to train and assist Afghan forces, while several thousand more U.S. soldiers are engaged in a separate mission focusing on al Qaeda and Islamic State.

(Writing by Mike Collett-White; Editing by Louise Ireland)

U.S. says 300 Islamic State fighters killed in Afghan operation

U.S. troops arrive at the site of an explosion in Kabul

By Sanjeev Miglani

NEW DELHI (Reuters) – Afghan forces, backed by the United States, have killed an estimated 300 Islamic State fighters in an operation mounted two weeks ago, the top U.S. and NATO commander in Afghanistan said on Wednesday, calling it a severe blow to the group.

General John Nicholson said the offensive in the eastern province of Nangarhar was part of U.S. operations to degrade the capabilities of Islamic State wherever it raised its head, whether in Iraq and Syria or in Afghanistan.

The group, believed to be confined to three or four of the more than 400 districts in Afghanistan, last month claimed responsibility for bombing a demonstration by the Shi’ite Hazara minority in the capital, Kabul, in which at least 80 people were killed.

Nicholson, in New Delhi for talks with the Indian military which has provided training and some arms to Afghanistan, said Afghan forces supported by the United States had just carried out a counter-terrorism operation against Islamic State.

“They killed a number of top leaders of the organization and upto 300 of their fighters,” he told reporters.

“Obviously it’s difficult to get an exact count, but what this amounts to is about 25 percent of the organization at least, and so this represents a severe setback for them.”

Islamic State first appeared in Afghanistan at the beginning of 2015, and had about 3,000 fighters at the height of the movement, many of them former members of militant groups such as the Pakistani Taliban and the Islamic Movement of Uzbekistan.

Previously considered a much smaller threat than its bitter enemies the Taliban, the group’s bomb attack in Kabul underlined how dangerous it could be, even without holding large tracts of territory.

On Tuesday, another U.S. military official said American soldiers helping Afghan troops fight Islamic State in Nangarhar were forced to abandon equipment and weapons when their position came under fire.

Fighters from the group had circulated photographs of a rocket launcher, grenades, ammunition, identification cards, an encrypted radio and other equipment they said they had seized.

By being more aggressive, the Afghan military were more successful this year against the Taliban than in 2015, when they lost 5,000 men, Nicholson said.

The killing of Afghan Taliban chief Mullah Mohammad Akhtar Mansour in a U.S. drone strike in Pakistan had been a greater blow to the group than they had let on, partly because the Taliban were having trouble getting control of the finances he dealt with, Nicholson said.

(Editing by Clarence Fernandez)

Civilian casualties increase as Afghanistan troops battle Taliban

Broken glass and debris are seen inside a resturant a day after a suicide attack in Kabul, Afghanistan

By Josh Smith

KABUL (Reuters) – Civilians are being killed and wounded in record numbers in Afghanistan, the United Nations reported on Monday, just days after one of the deadliest attacks ever in Kabul.

Overall at least 1,601 civilians were killed and 3,565 wounded in the war in the first six months of 2016, the United Nations reported, as insurgent groups like the Taliban try to topple the government installed in Kabul after the 2001 U.S.-led military intervention.

Anti-government groups, the largest of which is the Taliban, accounted for at least 60 percent of non-combatants killed and wounded.

Twin blasts on Saturday were claimed by Islamic State militants and killed at least 80 people and injured more than 230, most of them civilians.

Those numbers are not included in the U.N. report, but the attack highlighted its finding that suicide bombings and complex attacks are now harming more civilians than are roadside bombs.

Casualties caused by pro-government forces increased 47 percent over the same period last year, the United Nations said.

Afghan forces were responsible for 22 percent of casualties overall, and the international troops remaining in the country caused 2 percent, while 17 percent could not be attributed to one side or the other.

For the first time, the Afghan air force killed or wounded more civilians in its operations than did air strikes carried out by international forces, the United Nations reported.

U.N. officials said they had heard more commitments by both sides, but few effective actions to improve protection of civilians.

“Every civilian casualty represents a failure of commitment and should be a call to action for parties to the conflict to take meaningful, concrete steps to reduce civilians’ suffering and increase protection,” Tadamichi Yamamoto, the top U.N. official in Afghanistan, said in the report.

“Platitudes not backed by meaningful action ring hollow over time. History and the collective memory of the Afghan people will judge leaders of all parties to this conflict by their actual conduct.”

‘INDISCRIMINATE TACTICS’

More than 1,500 children were killed and wounded by the war, in the highest toll ever recorded in a six-month period by the United Nations.

Most civilians were caught up in ground clashes between the two sides as the Taliban increasingly threatened population centers and government troops went on the offensive following the withdrawal of most international combat troops in 2014.

Ground engagements accounted for 38 percent of casualties, followed by complex and suicide attacks at 20 percent, U.N. investigators found.

Casualties caused by roadside bombs decreased dramatically, by 21 percent, a drop the United Nations attributed to changes in the nature of the conflict, as well as better bomb-detection by the government.

The report was sharply critical of the Taliban, who “continued using indiscriminate tactics, including carrying out devastating complex and suicide attacks in civilian areas”.

Islamic State, a group that has made some limited inroads in Afghanistan, accounted for 122 casualties in the first six months of 2016 compared with 13 casualties attributed to it in the same period last year.

The increasing number of casualties caused by the government, meanwhile, was largely due to wide use of heavy explosives during ground battles, investigators reported.

Aerial operations by the Afghan air force in 2016 caused more than triple the number of civilian casualties during the same period in 2015, according to the report, as new aircraft and weapons were deployed.

At least 111 civilians, 85 of them women or children, were killed or wounded by Afghan helicopters and warplanes.

On June 13, for example, Afghan helicopters fired rockets and machine guns at a funeral ceremony for a Taliban member, killing or wounding at least 15 women and children, alongside insurgents, investigators found.

U.N. officials called for an immediate halt to the use of air strikes in populated areas and urged Afghan air crews to use “greater restraint”.

While international forces declared their combat mission over at the end of 2014, they continue to conduct air strikes and special operations missions.

Air strikes by international forces, comprised mostly of American warplanes, caused 38 deaths and 12 injuries among civilians, the U.N. reported.

(Reporting by Josh Smith; Editing by Robert Birsel)