Afghanistan — Numerous Insurgents Killed, Captured in Afghanistan

WASHINGTON, July 21, 2010 — Numer­ous insur­gents were killed or cap­tured dur­ing recent Afghan-coali­tion oper­a­tions con­duct­ed across Afghanistan, mil­i­tary offi­cials report­ed. In oper­a­tions yesterday: 

An Afghan-inter­na­tion­al secu­ri­ty force detained a sus­pect­ed insur­gent in Hel­mand province while in pur­suit of a senior Tal­iban tac­ti­cal com­man­der who is known to direct Tal­iban fight­ers in impro­vised explo­sive device attacks. He also coor­di­nates kid­nap­pings and intim­i­da­tion cam­paigns against Afghan civil­ians. The secu­ri­ty force went to a com­pound in rur­al Nad ‘Ali dis­trict to search the area. After secur­ing the area, the sus­pect­ed insur­gent was detained for fur­ther ques­tion­ing by the secu­ri­ty force after inter­view­ing the res­i­dents of the com­pound. Afghan and coali­tion forces have focused their atten­tion on Hel­mand province over the last cou­ple of months. Since May 1, more than a dozen Tal­iban lead­ers have been cap­tured along with numer­ous sus­pect­ed insur­gents in oper­a­tions there. 

— An Afghan-inter­na­tion­al secu­ri­ty force killed sev­er­al insur­gents and detained sev­er­al more in Kun­duz province last night. The secu­ri­ty force was in pur­suit of a Tal­iban sub­com­man­der who facil­i­tates weapons and orders impro­vised explo­sive device and rock­et attacks against Afghan civil­ians and Afghan and coali­tion forces. The sub­com­man­der is in reg­u­lar con­tact with Tal­iban and Haqqani Net­work senior lead­ers locat­ed in Pak­istan. The secu­ri­ty force went to the first of a series of com­pounds in the vil­lage of Qareh Khani in Cha­har Darah dis­trict and Afghan forces used a loud­speak­er to call for all occu­pants to peace­ful­ly exit the com­pounds. One heav­i­ly armed indi­vid­ual ran out­side the com­pound and engaged the secu­ri­ty force. The com­bined force returned fire killing the insurgent. 

The com­bined force moved to clear and secure the build­ing. While clear­ing the area, the secu­ri­ty force was engaged by an insur­gent bar­ri­cad­ed with­in one of the build­ings and anoth­er insur­gent in the court­yard. Return­ing fire, the assault force killed the insur­gents. After the com­pound was cleared and secured, the assault force detained two sus­pect­ed insur­gents for fur­ther questioning. 

At the sec­ond com­pound two armed males ran from the build­ings into some thick veg­e­ta­tion. Afghan forces called for the indi­vid­u­als to peace­ful­ly sur­ren­der, how­ev­er they engaged the com­bined force and were sub­se­quent­ly killed. After the sec­ond com­pound was cleared and secured, the secu­ri­ty force ques­tioned the remain­ing res­i­dents. One sus­pect­ed insur­gent was detained by the secu­ri­ty force for fur­ther ques­tion­ing. Weapons and IED mate­ri­als includ­ing blast­ing caps and wire were found at the com­pounds. The women and chil­dren present were pro­tect­ed through­out the searches. 

— Afghan and coali­tion forces in the Kab­ul area detained a Tal­iban facil­i­ta­tor last night believed to be in final prepa­ra­tion stages for attacks against the inter­na­tion­al con­fer­ence. He is assessed to facil­i­tate sui­cide bombers and weapons for the Kab­ul attack net­work. The secu­ri­ty force went to the com­pound near Ahangaran in Musahi dis­trict and Afghan forces used a loud­speak­er to call for all occu­pants to peace­ful­ly exit the build­ings. After the com­pound was cleared and secured, the com­bined secu­ri­ty force detained the facil­i­ta­tor. No shots were fired and women and chil­dren present were pro­tect­ed through­out the operation. 

— Afghan and coali­tion forces detained sev­er­al sus­pect­ed insur­gents in Khost province yes­ter­day, includ­ing a Haqqani Net­work com­man­der respon­si­ble for plan­ning and facil­i­tat­ing attacks against coali­tion forces in the province. The cap­tured com­man­der also is the head mul­lah of a madras­sa in the vil­lage of Lak­en where he had planned attacks and recruit­ed Haqqani oper­a­tives and sui­cide bombers. A secu­ri­ty force went to a series of com­pounds near the vil­lage of Kamar Kala in Khost dis­trict and searched the area. After the secu­ri­ty force cleared and secured the build­ings, they detained the com­man­der who iden­ti­fied him­self as the tar­get­ed indi­vid­ual in the oper­a­tion. Sev­er­al addi­tion­al sus­pect­ed insur­gents were also detained for fur­ther ques­tion­ing. One AK-47 rifle was found at the scene. 

— An Afghan and coali­tion secu­ri­ty force detained sev­er­al sus­pect­ed insur­gents in Kan­da­har province yes­ter­day, includ­ing a Tal­iban weapons facil­i­ta­tor oper­at­ing in Kan­da­har. The weapons deal­er also assists with the move­ment of for­eign fight­ers into the area and coor­di­nates assas­si­na­tions with­in Kan­da­har. The secu­ri­ty force tar­get­ed a com­pound in the Zharay dis­trict in pur­suit of the facil­i­ta­tor. Afghan forces used a loud­speak­er to call for all occu­pants to peace­ful­ly exit the com­pound. After ques­tion­ing the res­i­dents, the secu­ri­ty force detained the facil­i­ta­tor and sev­er­al addi­tion­al sus­pect­ed insur­gents for fur­ther ques­tion­ing. No shots were fired and the women and chil­dren were pro­tect­ed through­out the search. 

— An Afghan civil­ian was wound­ed in an impro­vised explo­sive device explo­sion in Charkh dis­trict, Log­ar province, yes­ter­day. Afghan Nation­al Police trans­port­ed the wound­ed civil­ian to a local hos­pi­tal for treat­ment. Accord­ing to con­firmed reports, insur­gents have killed 87 civil­ians and wound­ed 193 in the past three weeks. 

— Six Afghan Nation­al Police were behead­ed by insur­gents in Dahanah-ye Ghori dis­trict, Bagh­lan province, yes­ter­day. ANP forces suc­cess­ful­ly repelled an insur­gent attack on a school, clin­ic and the dis­trict gov­er­nors’ build­ing in Dahanah-ye Ghori city, killing sev­er­al insur­gents. Dur­ing the attack, insur­gents over­ran a police check­point and killed the police offi­cers by cut­ting off their heads. 

“This inci­dent once again demon­strates the bru­tal, bar­bar­ic and sense­less acts com­mit­ted by the Tal­iban,” said Col. Rafael Tor­res, ISAF Joint Com­mand Com­bined Joint Oper­a­tions Cen­ter direc­tor. “We remain com­mit­ted to serv­ing along­side our Afghan part­ners to improve secu­ri­ty and devel­op­ment for all Afghans.” 

In July 19 operations: 

— An Afghan civil­ian was killed and eight civil­ians were wound­ed by insur­gents’ small-arms and rock­et-pro­pelled grenade fire dur­ing an attack on an ISAF patrol in the Dand dis­trict of Kan­da­har province. The wound­ed were tak­en to Mir­wais hos­pi­tal in Kan­da­har. Afghan gov­ern­ment and secu­ri­ty forces offi­cials are inves­ti­gat­ing the incident. 

— An Afghan civil­ian was wound­ed in an impro­vised explo­sive device explo­sion in Charkh dis­trict, Log­ar province. Afghan Nation­al Police trans­port­ed the wound­ed civil­ian to a local hos­pi­tal for treatment. 

In July 18 operations: 

— Insur­gents fired a mor­tar round at a large group of Afghan men, women and chil­dren gath­ered in north­ern Zab­ul province as they wait­ed for reg­u­lar­ly-sched­uled med­ical out­reach to begin. “Although no one was injured, this inci­dent demon­strat­ed to Zab­ul cit­i­zens the insur­gents’ use of indis­crim­i­nate weapons fired against the local pop­u­la­tion,” said a coali­tion med­ical offi­cer who was assist­ing with the out­reach when the mor­tar land­ed nearby. 

— Afghan gov­ern­ment offi­cials and dis­trict elders held a com­mu­ni­ty out­reach shu­ra in Mar­jah and came away more water for the dis­trict. Afghan army and ISAF forces from the local vil­lage sta­bil­i­ty oper­a­tion pro­vid­ed secu­ri­ty to sup­port the meet­ing between dis­trict elders and region­al water and gov­ern­ment offi­cials to dis­cuss the lack of water in south­ern Mar­jah, Hel­mand province. Yar Moham­mad, the governor’s rep­re­sen­ta­tive, said that improve­ment in the water sup­ply avail­able for local agri­cul­tur­al and civic require­ments was possible

— but would depend in part on assis­tance from elders in the region. The elders said they were will­ing to work togeth­er with oth­ers in the region to keep the canals clean and secure if dis­trict offi­cials could make water avail­able on a more con­sis­tent basis for res­i­dents of south­ern Mar­jah. Direc­tor Khan Agha of the Hel­mund Arghandab Val­ley Author­i­ty said he would take per­son­al con­trol of the Nad Ali dis­trict water sup­ply and close the locks to the north­east for 10 days and open the feed­er canals to south­ern Mar­jah to increase the avail­able water for irri­ga­tion and oth­er uses in the south. 

The elders agreed to work close­ly with gov­ern­ment offi­cials to con­tin­ue the col­lab­o­ra­tive approach to solv­ing com­plex issues con­fronting the region. The elders also agreed it was impor­tant to include all par­ties from the area in future dis­cus­sions of region­al issues. Afghan and ISAF forces agreed to help gov­ern­ment and elder rep­re­sen­ta­tives to sup­port an expand­ed shura. 

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