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The Taliban have captured the key Afghan town of Pul-e-Khumri, 140 miles north of the capital Kabul, giving insurgents control of a strategic road junction connecting Kabul to the north and west, according to insurgents and local officials.
Two city officials told the Guardian it fell to the Taliban after heavy fighting on Tuesday as officials and security forces abandoned their complexes.
“Pul-e-Khumri has fallen into the hands of the Taliban, they are everywhere,” an official said in a telephone interview in which heavy gunfire could be heard.
“Taliban fighters broke through the front lines in several directions during the afternoon. After heavy clashes, officials and security forces abandoned the governorate, intelligence and police headquarters. Violent clashes continue. We are deciding where to retreat now.
A Taliban spokesperson on Twitter also claimed responsibility for the capture of the city, capital of Baghlan province. Images on social media showed the flag of the Taliban outside the city and insurgent fighters inside the city.
If confirmed, Pul-e-Khumri would be the eighth of 34 provincial capitals captured by the outright Islamist movement in less than a week.
The fall of the city to the Taliban would be a blow to the Afghan government, threatening the remaining towns in northern Afghanistan that are not yet under insurgent control, including Mazar-i-Sharif and Faizabad.
Earlier on Tuesday, a senior EU official warned that the Taliban’s strategy in northern Afghanistan appeared to be to cut off the capital, Kabul, from northern forces that could support it.
The latest gains in the Taliban’s lightning advance came when a US envoy for peace in Afghanistan warned the Taliban that any government that came to power by force in Afghanistan would not be internationally recognized.
US envoy Zalmay Khalilzad traveled to Doha, Qatar, where the Taliban maintains a political office, to tell the group that there is no point in pursuing victory on the battlefield because a military takeover of Kabul would guarantee that they would be global outcasts.
Khalilzad’s comments came as UN human rights chief Michelle Bachelet warned of a growing Taliban campaign targeting current and former government officials and their family members for “summary execution” and destruction of their homes and other property.
According to the EU, around 400,000 Afghans have been displaced by the fighting in recent months.
Khalilzad and others hope to persuade the Taliban leadership to resume peace talks with the Afghan government as US and NATO forces finish withdrawing from the country.
Over the past two months, the Taliban have rapidly expanded the territory they control to about 65 percent of the country, including much of rural areas. A third of the country’s provincial capitals are threatened.
The Taliban military leader on Tuesday released an audio message to his fighters ordering them not to harm Afghan forces and government officials in the territories they have conquered.
In the nearly five-minute audio, Mohammad Yaqoob, the son of the late Taliban leader Mullah Mohammad Omar, also told insurgents to stay outside the abandoned homes of government and security officials who had fled. , to keep markets open and to protect places of business. , including banks.
It was not immediately clear whether the Taliban fighters on the ground would follow Yaqoob’s instructions. Civilians who fled the Taliban’s advances reported that insurgents had suffered brutal treatment – schools were torched and restrictions against women were cracked down.
In a separate intervention on Tuesday, the UN human rights chief called for an end to the Taliban offensive against Afghan cities and said her office was receiving reports of possible war crimes .
“The Taliban must cease their military operations in the cities. Unless all parties return to the negotiating table and reach a peaceful settlement, the already dire situation for so many Afghans will worsen, ”Bachelet said in a statement.
Bachelet’s remarks came as heavily armed fighters stormed the town of Farah on Tuesday morning, the Taliban announcing that their “special forces” had arrived in the town.
The Taliban also released photos of their triumphant fighters standing outside the city’s main administrative building.
Following a now familiar pattern, a Farah official who spoke to the Guardian described an unsuccessful request for reinforcements and desertions from the government.
“No help has arrived from Kabul so far, and we are not waiting for them any longer, if they wanted to send aid they should have sent it,” the official said. “One of the intelligence officers changed sides last night and joined the Taliban with several of his men.”
Another local official said earlier on Tuesday: “The Taliban have been active in the outskirts of Farah town for weeks, but they launched their big assault last night and were pushed back. But now they are moving forward again. The official was surrounded by the Taliban at a government compound and the Guardian could not reach him after the city fell.
Farah’s fall followed the capture of Zaranj by the Taliban on Friday, which was followed two days later by the enormous symbolic capture of Kunduz, a strategic town close to the border with Tajikistan and an important political hub and military. The group also claimed Sheberghan, the capital of the northern province of Jawzjan, Taloqan in the province of Takhar, Sar-e Pul in the northern province of the same name and Aybak in the province of Samangan.
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