Afghanistan to rush troops to border
Afghan authorities prepared on Saturday to retake a key border crossing seized by the Taliban in a sweeping offensive that the insurgents claim has helped capture a vast swath of the violence-wracked nation.
As US troops continued their withdrawal, the Taliban said its fighters had seized two crossings in western Afghanistan — completing an arc of territory from the Iranian border to the frontier with China.
It now held 85 per cent of the country, a Taliban official said, controlling about 250 of Afghanistan’s nearly 400 districts — a claim impossible to independently verify, and disputed by the government.
On Friday Taliban spokesman Zabihullah Mujahid said their fighters had captured the border town of Islam Qala on the Iranian frontier and the Torghundi crossing with Turkmenistan.
Herat governor spokesman Jilani Farhad said the authorities were deploying fresh troops to retake Islam Qala post, the biggest trade crossing between Iran and Afghanistan. “They will be sent there soon’’, he said.
The Afghan government has repeatedly dismissed the Taliban’s gains as having little strategic value, but the seizure of multiple border crossings and the taxes they generate will likely fill the group’s coffers with new revenue.
With the Taliban having routed much of northern Afghanistan in recent weeks, the government holds little more than a constellation of provincial capitals that must largely be reinforced and resupplied by air.
The air force was under severe strain even before the Taliban’s lightning offensive overwhelmed the government’s northern and western positions, putting further pressure on the country’s limited aircraft and pilots.
On Thursday President Joe Biden said the US military mission would end on August 31 — nearly 20 years after it began — but he admitted it was “highly unlikely” Kabul would be able to control the entire country.