Taliban ratchet up their attacks

KABUL, Afghanistan — The Taliban have returned to an all-out offensive on the battlefield, killing dozens of Afghan security forces each day, officials say, even as U.S. officials try to keep alive a peace deal to end the long war in Afghanistan.

The insurgents have ignored appeals for a ceasefire on humanitarian grounds as the fast-spreading coronavirus threatens to overwhelm the country’s health system and wreck an economy already dependent on foreign donations. They accuse the United States of not upholding its end of the deal signed in February, which promised the release of up to 5,000 Taliban prisoners held by the Afghan government in a matter of 10 days, as a prelude to direct talks between the two sides on a cease-fire and powersharing.

President Donald Trump spoke by phone Wednesday with the emir of Qatar, where the Taliban’s negotiating team is based, about “the importance of the Taliban reducing violence and continuing discussions on prisoner releases,” the White House said. Trump’s peace envoy, Zalmay Khalilzad, and Gen. Austin Miller, the commander in charge of the U.S. and NATO forces in Afghanistan, also traveled to Qatar this month for meetings with the Taliban.

There was no statement from the U.S. side about what was discussed, but the Taliban said the talks had focused on the “complete implementation of the agreement as well as delay in the release of the prisoners.” In the past, violence levels have been a major part of the discussion when the U.S. military commander has participated.

With the peace deal seemingly stuck, the insurgents have continued ratcheting up attacks across the country.

The country had just 1,351 confirmed coronavirus cases as of Friday and 43 deaths. But disarray and a lack of widespread testing — just over 7,000 have been conducted, according to the country’s health ministry — mean the true number could be far higher.

One senior Afghan official said the insurgents had launched an average of about 50 attacks per day over the past two weeks and government records show as many as 100 attacks across the country on some days. A Western military official said the average over that period was more than 70 attacks per day.

In that period, 25-40 Afghan forces have been killed each day, according to two Afghan security officials. Government reports also show high casualties to the Taliban — on some days higher than the death toll of the Afghan security forces — but those figures could not be verified independently.

The one change in Taliban tactics seems to be that the insurgents are not currently publicizing each attack as vigorously across their robust social media and online platforms. They have also stayed away from any major bombings inside cities.

In one of the latest gruesome attacks in western Badghis province, Taliban fighters began an assault late Thursday as an Afghan government militia unit was preparing food for a meal before fasting for the holy month of Ramadan. That attack killed at least 13 members of the militia, known as Public Uprisings, which is funded and supplied by the Afghan government.