Tolo News: Atta Mohammad Noor, acting governor of northern Balkh province, on Sunday said Daesh insurgents are trying to infiltrate the province. He confirmed the presence of Daesh in Balkh and said security forces discovered documents during the Khorshid 21 military operation in the province. He said the documents show signs of the group’s presence in the
India Today: Sheikh Ahmad Badreddin Hassoun, the Grand Mufti of Syria, has claimed that countries like Pakistan and Afghanistan were providing strategic and logistic support to the ISIS. In an exclusive interview with India Today’s Sanjay Bragta, Hassoun hailed India as Syria’s ‘all weather friend’ while claiming that ISIS fighters were being trained in the Tora
VOA News Carla Babb March 10, 2016 PENTAGON—The Taliban is fracturing in Afghanistan’s Helmand province, a known Taliban stronghold, a U.S. general in Kabul said Thursday. General Wilson Shoffner told reporters via telephone that the U.S. is seeing an “emergence of three separate Taliban groups” in northern Helmand, and that all three factions are largely
VOA News Ayaz Gul March 6, 2016 ISLAMABAD, PAKISTAN—Afghan President Ashraf Ghani said his security forces have uprooted loyalists of the Islamic State group in Afghanistan. Addressing lawmakers at the opening of parliament in Kabul Sunday, he said IS is one of the elements in the current Afghan conflict, but it is only fighting to
Tolo News: Baghlan police said on Friday troops have broken through the Taliban’s defense line in Dand-e Ghori and have almost cleared the area of insurgents. Baghlan police said that after days of fighting, the security forces finally broke through the Taliban’s defense line and that the troops are now moving forward, towards the center of
By RFE/RL’s Radio Free Afghanistan March 2, 2016 A suicide attack targeted India’s diplomatic compound in the eastern Afghan city of Jalalabad on March 2, with explosions and gunfire rattling the diplomatic district. RFE/RL’s correspondent in Jalalabad reports that a suicide car bomber detonated an explosives-filled vehicle outside the entrance gates of the Indian consulate
Khaama Press: The Afghan intelligence operatives thwarted a coordinated suicide car bombing plot in the provincial capital of southern Kandahar province. The National Directorate of Security (NDS) said four groups of militants comprised of 26 insurgents were detained by the intelligence operatives in connection to the attack plot. A statement by NDS said the groups were looking
Michael Hughes: Just as the spirit of rapprochement between Kabul and Islamabad is in the air on the eve of talks with the insurgency, it appears Pakistan’s military chieftains have sunk to a new nadir amid reports they are supporting Daesh, otherwise known as the Islamic State, the sworn enemy of the Taliban and Al
VOA News Noor Zahid February 26, 2016 Two former Islamic State (IS) commanders who defected recently to authorities in Afghanistan told VOA’s Ashna TV that they joined the extremist group not because of ideology but largely for money. The revelations underline a discrepancy between those who join IS in Syria and Iraq and the fighters
Tolo News: As the Afghan National Army (ANA) continues its offensives against insurgents in Qoshtepa district of Jawzjan province, soldiers on Friday managed to recover the heads of two ANA officers beheaded by the Taliban five days ago. Taliban captured ANA officers Rahmatullah and Fayaz from Qoshtepa five days ago and hanged their heads on a