Afghanistan — Afghan, Coalition Detain Insurgents, Seize Weapons

WASHINGTON — Afghan and coali­tion forces detained sev­er­al insur­gents and seized a large weapons cache in Afghanistan yes­ter­day in oper­a­tions focused on dis­man­tling ter­ror­ist groups’ lead­er­ship, mil­i­tary offi­cials said.

Afghan and Inter­na­tion­al Secu­ri­ty Assis­tance Force troops tar­get­ed two Tal­iban dis­trict com­man­ders in charge of the Garm Ser and Nawah-ye Barakzai dis­tricts of Hel­mand province, and detained sev­er­al sus­pect­ed insurgents. 

The first com­bined force tar­get­ed the Garm Ser dis­trict com­man­der, who directs attacks against coali­tion forces, and pro­vides weapons and sup­plies to Tal­iban fight­ers. The force searched a com­pound in Moham­mad Rahim Kalay and, after ques­tion­ing res­i­dents at the scene, detained sev­er­al sus­pect­ed insurgents. 

A sep­a­rate secu­ri­ty force tar­get­ed a com­pound in the remote Mar­ja dis­trict in pur­suit of the Nawah-ye Barakzai dis­trict com­man­der, who recent­ly returned from Pak­istan. As the assault force approached the com­pound, three men attempt­ed to escape, but the secu­ri­ty force was able to cap­ture them peace­ful­ly. The force detained sev­er­al sus­pect­ed insur­gents and found five pounds of wet opi­um at the scene. In oth­er oper­a­tions yes­ter­day in Afghanistan: 

— A com­bined force detained two sus­pect­ed insur­gents while in pur­suit of a Tal­iban mem­ber involved in weapons traf­fick­ing and plant­i­ng road­side bombs. The force detained the men after search­ing com­pounds in the Pul‑e Alam dis­trict and ques­tion­ing res­i­dents at the scene. 

— A com­bined force oper­at­ing in the Ghazni dis­trict of Ghazni province locat­ed a cache of about 240 anti­tank rounds, 31 rock­et-pro­pelled grenade war­heads, sev­en RPG rock­et motors and two 107 mm rock­ets. The com­bined forced con­duct­ed a con­trolled explo­sion to destroy the cache. 

— Insur­gents’ bombs killed 12 Afghan civil­ians in two sep­a­rate inci­dents in east­ern provinces. In the first inci­dent, three Afghan con­struc­tion work­ers were killed and two were wound­ed when a bomb det­o­nat­ed in Ghazni’s Qarabaugh dis­trict. Lat­er, nine con­struc­tion work­ers were killed by a remote-con­trolled bomb while work­ing in Kunar’s Bar Kunar dis­trict. Also, a com­bined force killed four insur­gents and destroyed nar­cotics and explo­sives dur­ing an Aug. 4 oper­a­tion in Helmand’s San­gin dis­trict of Hel­mand province. The team was search­ing for a key Tal­iban leader of a home­made bomb fac­to­ry when they encoun­tered the insur­gents. Women and chil­dren were pro­tect­ed through­out the oper­a­tion. Drugs, explo­sives and weapons were dis­cov­ered and destroyed at the scene. 

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

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