Afghanistan — Troops Follow Intelligence Leads, Detain Insurgents

WASHINGTON, Nov. 16, 2010 — Afghan and coali­tion secu­ri­ty forces fol­lowed intel­li­gence leads and cap­tured more than 20 insur­gents yes­ter­day in their search for Tal­iban and Haqqani ter­ror­ist net­work lead­er­ship oper­at­ing in east­ern and south­ern Afghanistan, mil­i­tary offi­cials report­ed.
The part­nered secu­ri­ty forces detained the insur­gents dur­ing three sep­a­rate oper­a­tions, offi­cials said.

In the Nawah-ye Barakzai dis­trict of Hel­mand province, Afghan and coali­tion forces detained sev­er­al sus­pect­ed insur­gents dur­ing an oper­a­tion aimed at cap­tur­ing a Tal­iban leader who recent­ly returned from Pak­istan and has been try­ing to pro­vide lead­er­ship to Tal­iban mem­bers in the province’s Nawah dis­trict since their dis­trict leader was detained in October. 

The Tal­iban leader is direct­ly involved in plan­ning attacks against Afghan and coali­tion secu­ri­ty mem­bers and facil­i­tat­ing road­side-bomb com­po­nents and report­ed­ly has been involved in plan­ning a large-scale attack, offi­cials said. The com­bined team destroyed sev­er­al weapons dur­ing the search in addi­tion to detain­ing the sus­pect­ed insurgents. 

A part­nered secu­ri­ty force in Pak­tia province’s Zur­mat dis­trict detained nine sus­pect­ed insur­gents while search­ing for a Tal­iban leader who is linked to mul­ti­ple kid­nap­pings and mur­ders of Afghan civil­ians sus­pect­ed of sup­port­ing the Afghan gov­ern­ment or hav­ing Afghan vot­er cards, offi­cials said. 

In Khost province’s Sabari dis­trict, part­nered Afghan and coali­tion forces detained sev­er­al sus­pect­ed insur­gents while search­ing for a senior Haqqani leader who coor­di­nates the move­ment of weapons and bomb-mak­ing mate­ri­als and plans attacks. 

In oth­er news from Afghanistan: 

— Inter­na­tion­al Secu­ri­ty Assis­tance Force offi­cials con­firmed the Nov. 14 cap­ture of a Tal­iban leader oper­at­ing in Pak­tia province’s Zur­mat district. 

— Afghan and ISAF forces detained a Tal­iban leader and six oth­er men in Hel­mand province’s Nad‑e Ali dis­trict Nov. 13. The Tal­iban leader planned, coor­di­nat­ed and exe­cut­ed road­side-bomb attacks and also been direct­ly involved with Tal­iban lead­ers in Pak­istan in facil­i­tat­ing sui­cide-bomber attacks. 

— Afghan and ISAF forces found weapons and road­side-bomb com­po­nents in sev­en south­ern and east­ern Afghanistan loca­tions over the past two days. The caches were found in Kan­da­har, Uruz­gan and Kunar provinces, and includ­ed three 64 mm mor­tars, a 65 mm mor­tar, two 82 mm shells, three 57 mm shells, 25 rock­et-pro­pelled grenades, 11 frag­men­ta­tion high-explo­sive rounds, 1,800 7.62 mm rounds and an anti-per­son­nel mine. Com­bined forces also found 31 pres­sure plates, nine bat­ter­ies, three blast­ing caps and 150 pounds of home­made explo­sives in Hel­mand province, and an Afghan army patrol found 30 direc­tion­al anti-per­son­nel mines, mul­ti­ple weapons and ammu­ni­tion in Kan­da­har province. 

— Act­ing on intel­li­gence infor­ma­tion and tips from local res­i­dents, Afghan and ISAF forces detained two men and seized a large quan­ti­ty of nar­cotics in Nim­roz province’s Chakhansur dis­trict Nov. 13. The com­bined force attempt­ed to stop a sus­pi­cious vehi­cle that appeared to have numer­ous bags con­sis­tent with nar­cotics traf­fick­ing. As the force attempt­ed to stop the vehi­cle, the occu­pants start­ed shoot­ing at them and attempt­ed to flee. The secu­ri­ty force returned fire, wound­ing one of the occu­pants and dis­abling the vehi­cle. After secur­ing the site, the secu­ri­ty force pro­vid­ed med­ical atten­tion to the wound­ed man and found more than 1,800 pounds of opi­um, 425 pounds of crys­tal hero­in, almost 210 pounds of brown hero­in and sev­er­al auto­mat­ic weapons and asso­ci­at­ed ammu­ni­tion in the vehicle. 

— Sev­er­al Afghan civil­ians were killed, includ­ing a child, and sev­er­al oth­ers were wound­ed dur­ing insur­gent attacks in south­ern, east­ern and north­ern Afghanistan today. A sui­cide bomber killed a trib­al leader and wound­ed five Afghan civil­ians in Uruz­gan province’s Chorah dis­trict. An insur­gent-plant­ed road­side bomb in Pak­ti­ka province’s Bermal dis­trict killed an Afghan child. In Kun­duz province, two Afghan civil­ians were killed and eight oth­ers –- includ­ing the may­or of Kun­duz — were wound­ed when a road­side bomb explod­ed in the province’s Khan­abad district. 

Source:
Com­piled from Inter­na­tion­al Secu­ri­ty Assis­tance Force Joint Com­mand News Releases 

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