Taliban Overruns District in Afghanistan's Baghlan
TEHRAN (Tasnim) – Taliban militants have captured a key district in Afghanistan's northern province of Baghlan after days of fighting, Afghan officials say.
The militants launched a coordinated attack on Dahana-e-Ghori on Friday that led to heavy fighting in the area until the Taliban took control of the district on Monday.
Amir Gul Hussainkhil, deputy police chief of Baghlan, said Dahana-e-Ghori district was under siege for days and the Taliban managed to seize it because dozens of Afghan forces made "a tactical retreat".
"Afghan forces fought for days but no help arrived and they had to retreat and the Taliban captured the district," Hussainkhil said, adding that five Afghan police officers were killed.
However, the Taliban, known to exaggerate in their reporting of casualties and impact of the attacks for which they claim responsibility, said they killed and captured "many" policemen.
"We have hoisted our white flag in the district now. Many Afghan forces have been killed and 33 soldiers are captured," Zabihullah Mujahid, Taliban spokesman, told Al Jazeera.
"The importance of Baghlan province is that the main highway which links Kabul to the nine other provinces in the north and northeast of Afghanistan cross Baghalan province," he said.
"So if the Taliban manages to keep control of Dahana-e-Ghori and gain control of Baghlan-e-Markazi district, where heavy fighting is still going on, that could mean they will be able to control the main highway of the nine other districts."
Elsewhere, in the southern province of Helmand, fighting continues to rage in four districts as Afghan forces hold off fighters advancing on the provincial capital, according to government officials.
About 30,000 people have been displaced in Helmand in recent weeks, local officials said, with many of those fleeing to Lashkar Gah, the provincial capital, forced to abandon their lentil, maize and cotton crops during the lucrative harvest season.
One-third of casualties reported between January and June in Afghanistan were children, with 388 killed and 1,121 wounded, 18 percent more than in the first half of 2015, a figure the UN described as "alarming and shameful".
Fighting has escalated in Afghanistan as the Taliban insurgency spreads from its traditional strongholds in the south and east of the country to once peaceful regions in the north.