The Taliban said on Monday they had captured the last pocket of resistance AfghanistanPanjshir Valley, even as opposition fighters vowed to continue their struggle against radical Islamists.
After its lightning-fast defeat by Afghanistan’s military last month and after the ceremony when the last American troops left after 20 years of war, the Taliban turned to fighting the forces guarding the mountainous Panjshir Valley.
“With this victory, our country has completely come out of the quagmire of war,” chief spokesman Zabihullah Mujahid said.
A photo posted by the Taliban on social media shows its fighters at the governor’s office in Panjshir province.
However, the National Resistance Front (NRF), made up of anti-Taliban militias and former Afghan security forces, said its fighters were still present in “strategic positions” in the Valley, and were continuing to fight.
“We assure the people of Afghanistan that the struggle against the Taliban and their allies will continue until justice and freedom are achieved,” the NRF tweeted in English.
Late on Sunday night, he had acknowledged the great loss on the battlefield at Panjshir and called for a ceasefire.
The NRF includes local fighters loyal to Ahmed Masood, son of renowned anti-Soviet and anti-Taliban commander Ahmed Shah Masood – as well as remnants of Afghan forces retreating into the Panjshir Valley.
The group said in a tweet on Sunday that NRF spokesman Faheem Dashti – a noted Afghan journalist – and General Abdul Wood Zara, a prominent military commander, were killed in the latest fighting.
The NRF vowed to fight the Taliban, but also said it was ready to hold talks with Islamists. But the initial contact was unsuccessful.
The Panjshir Valley is famous for being the site of resistance to Soviet forces in the 1980s and the Taliban in the late 1990s.
Taliban government
The Taliban have yet to finalize their new regime after breaking into Kabul three weeks ago, analysts say, perhaps surprising even radical Islamists themselves.
Afghanistan’s new rulers have promised to be more “inclusive” than their first term in power, which also came after years of conflict – first the Soviet invasion of 1979, and then a bloody civil war.
He has promised a government that represents Afghanistan’s complex ethnic composition – though women are unlikely to join at the top level.
Women’s freedom in Afghanistan was sharply curtailed under the 1996–2001 regime of the Taliban.
The Taliban’s education authority said in a lengthy document released on Sunday that this time, women would be allowed to attend university as long as classes were separated by sex or at least a veil .
But girl students must also wear an abaya and niqab (face veil), as was mandatory under the previous Taliban regime, the even more conservative burqa.
As the Taliban grip their transition from extremism to government, they are faced with a range of challenges, including humanitarian needs, for which international aid is critical.
UN humanitarian chief Martin Griffith has arrived in Kabul for several days of meetings with the Taliban leadership, which has promised to help.
A statement by UN spokesman Stephane Dujarric said, “The authorities promised that the protection of humanitarian workers and humanitarian access to those in need would be guaranteed and freedom of movement would be guaranteed to humanitarian workers – both men and women.” ” .
A Taliban spokesman tweeted that the group’s delegation assured the UN of cooperation.
flurry of diplomacy
The international community is engaged in a flurry of diplomacy with the new Taliban regime.
US Secretary of State Antony Blinken is in Qatar on Monday, a key player in the Afghan saga.
Qatar, which hosts a major US military base, has been the gateway for 55,000 people pulled out of Afghanistan, nearly half of the total evacuated by US-led forces after the Taliban takeover on August 15.
Blinken will also speak to Qataris about efforts with Turkey to reopen Kabul’s airport, flying in badly needed humanitarian aid and evacuating the remaining Afghans.
Blinken will leave on Wednesday for the US airport in Ramstein, Germany, a temporary home for thousands of Afghans traveling to the United States, from where he will hold a virtual 20-nation ministerial meeting on the crisis with German Foreign Minister Heiko Maas. will do.
read all breaking news, breaking news And coronavirus news Here
.