Combined Force Seizes Taliban Leader

WASHINGTON, Feb. 3, 2012 — An Afghan and coali­tion secu­ri­ty force cap­tured a Tal­iban leader and detained one addi­tion­al sus­pect­ed insur­gent dur­ing an oper­a­tion in the Nahr‑E Saraj dis­trict of Afghanistan’s Hel­mand province today, mil­i­tary offi­cials report­ed.

The leader was a Tal­iban-appoint­ed deputy and head of the insur­gent group’s mil­i­tary com­mis­sion in Badghis province, offi­cials said. The cap­tured leader arranged large-scale attacks, dis­trib­uted weapons and col­lect­ed tax­es. He also rep­re­sent­ed both the Tal­iban and Islam­ic Move­ment of Uzbek­istan groups and was respon­si­ble for coor­di­nat­ing insur­gent activ­i­ties in Badghis and Faryab provinces. 

In Afghanistan oper­a­tions yesterday: 

— In the Bak­waw dis­trict of Farah province, a com­bined force detained three sus­pects and dis­cov­ered a drug and weapons cache. The cache con­tained approx­i­mate­ly 1,100 pounds of opi­um, 16 impro­vised explo­sive devices, sev­er­al con­tain­ers of explo­sive-mak­ing mate­ri­als, $1.5 mil­lion in Pak­istani cur­ren­cy and a motor­cy­cle rigged with explo­sives to be used as a sui­cide vehi­cle-borne IED. The weapons were destroyed. 

In Feb. 1 Afghanistan operations: 

— A com­bined force lib­er­at­ed a kid­napped Afghan cit­i­zen, detained sev­er­al sus­pect­ed insur­gents and seized mul­ti­ple small arms, ammu­ni­tion and tac­ti­cal vests in the Khogh­jani dis­trict of Ghazni province. The res­cued hostage received med­ical atten­tion and was tak­en to a coali­tion hos­pi­tal for fur­ther obser­va­tion. No civil­ians were harmed and no shots were fired dur­ing the operation. 

Source:
From an Inter­na­tion­al Secu­ri­ty Assis­tance Force Joint Com­mand News Release