Afghan-Iran Border Closed Since 20 Days After Taliban’s Clash with Iranian Border Guards

The NRF stated that Mullah Yaqoob, the Taliban's Defense Minister, was leading the operations. However, independent sources are yet to confirm if Mullah Yaqoob had travelled to the district and led the Taliban forces’ operations in Baghlan.

NRF claimed that 17 fighters of the Omari and Badri special units of the Taliban had been killed in the front’s counter attacks.

Sibghatullah Ahmadi, the spokesperson of the NRF, wrote on his Twitter account, that these units have left Baghlan province for Kabul after their defeat.

The Taliban have not yet reacted to the NRF statement.

On Friday, local sources of Afghanistan International had confirmed that the Taliban had concentrated their forces in Baghlan to suppress the resistance forces.

Reports show that for the past three days, along with Andarab district, heavy fighting had been going on in different areas of Panjshir province too.

A new wave of civilian killings in Panjshir and Baghlan

The Taliban operations have been accompanied by a wave of pressure tactics by the group against civilians in Baghlan and Panjshir provinces.

Local sources reported that on Sunday, the Taliban killed a woman in Abshar district of Panjshir province. According to sources, 43-year-old Sharifa was shot while on her way to deliver food to her husband in Parangal village.

Taliban fighters have told locals in the district that they killed the woman on their suspicion of her collaborating with the NRF.

According to the sources, the husband of the dead woman had gone to the mountains "with the permission of the Taliban" to collect firewood, and his wife had left the house to deliver food to him.

In the meantime, local sources from Khost district of Baghlan province reported on Saturday, last week, that Ziaul Haq Raid, a former local employee of the Ministry of Finance in Pul Khumri district, was shot dead after three days of torture in a Taliban prison.

According to the sources, the young man's body was handed over to his family on July 9. Raid was imprisoned because of his family’s relationship with one of the commanders of the NRF and was killed after three days of torture.

Meanwhile, local sources told Afghanistan International that on Monday morning, the Taliban shot dead a civilian named Sayed Aman Osmani, in Sachi Bala village in Khost district of Baghlan province.

Sayed Aman was a civil servant of Pul-e-Khumri Municipality and was visiting his family during Eid-al- Adha holidays in the area.

Residents of Khost district said that Osmani's family lives in Sachi Bala village and the Taliban pulled him out of their tent and shot him dead. Osmani studied at the Faculty of Persian Language and Literature of Baghlan University.

According to the report, 11 people had also been injured in this incident. Puli Khumri hospital officials said that their health condition is serious.

Sources told Afghanistan International that one of the injured died, bringing the death toll to nine.

Most of the highways of Afghanistan, especially in northern and southern provinces, have witnessed deadly accidents.

Local sources say that damaged roads and lack of traffic signages are the main causes of traffic accidents.

In a joint statement released after US President Joe Biden held talks with senior Saudi officials on Friday, the two sides also underscored the importance of continued humanitarian support in the Taliban-run country, while promoting the rights of the Afghan people including the rights of women and girls to education and availability of the highest attainable standard of health and, for women, the right to work.

Saudi Arabia and the US affirmed that both nations share the vision of confronting terrorism and violent extremism. They expressed their continued commitment to counter Al-Qaeda and ISIS, stem the flow of foreign fighters, counter violent extremist propaganda, and cut off terrorist financing streams.

During their discussion, the two sides highlighted the joint efforts through the Terrorist Financing Targeting Center, which is based in the Kingdom of Saudi Arabia.

Biden had visited Saudi Arabia at the invitation of King Salman bin Abdulaziz, with the two sides pledging to tackle key regional and international issues.

The US also renewed its commitment to supporting Saudi Arabia’s security and territorial defence, importantly, facilitating the kingdom’s ability to obtain necessary capabilities to defend its people and territory against external threats.

Hekmatyar said that “the dream of federalism will never come true in Afghanistan”.

Dobbins had said that a federal system could support the development of Afghanistan. According to Dobbins if Afghans reached a conclusion based on their need to have a federal state, it will benefit Afghanistan and help in the development of the country.

He stressed that a republic order with elected governors would be useful for sharing power in Afghanistan.

However, Gulbuddin Hekmatyar, during the Friday prayers, opposed the federal system in Afghanistan and attacked those who welcomed Dobbins' views.

He accused supporters of the federal system of paving the way towards partition of the country.

According to Hekmatyar, Dobbins proposes a federal state to justify America's failures in Afghanistan and not as a humanitarian solution to overcome Afghanistan’s crisis.

The leader of Hizb-e-Islami accused the US of having killed about a million people in Afghanistan. He said that the US didn’t invade Afghanistan for democracy, human rights, or establishment of a government capable of running the country, but they attacked Afghanistan to take "revenge" for 9/11.

To justify his opposition to the federal system, Hekmatyar said, "The conditions in Afghanistan are not favourable for a federal system. Afghanistan is not like the United States, which is made up of fifty states, each one is bigger than Afghanistan, and Afghanistan cannot be divided into different states based on ethnicity, such as Pakistan."

Hekmatyar also made sensitive statements about different ethnic groups in Afghanistan. For example, he said that Panjshir was a district in the past, but "because of twenty years of occupation, it became a province”.

He said that Pakistan has been divided into four different states based on ethnic Punjabis, Pashtuns, Sindhis and Baloch, but the social structure of Afghanistan is such that different ethnic groups live together.

The leader of Hizb-e-Islami claimed that "except for Panjshir, there is no province in which only Tajiks are present”.

According to him, "Pashtuns are present in all northern provinces except Badakhshan. Pashtuns are the majority in Baghlan and Kunduz, and there is no province from north to the west where Pashtuns are not present."

"With this ethnic composition, how can a federal system be shaped based on ethnicity?” Hekmatyar questioned.

AFF claimed that 28 Taliban fighters had been killed and 18 others had been injured in the clashes.

Taliban officials have not commented on the launch of any operations in Baghlan and the casualties inflicted to its forces.

On Thursday, Mullah Yaqoob, the Taliban's Defense Minister, visited Andrab district and Qari Fasihuddin, the group's Chief of Staff of army, went to Khost district of Baghlan province.

According to local sources, the two senior military officials of the Taliban had asked NRF and AFF forces in the two districts of Khost and Andrab to "surrender" to the group, which was rejected by the resistance forces.

There are also reports of massive deployment of Taliban forces in Baghlan province. Sources have also reported clashes between Taliban fighters and the NRF forces in Dara-e Qasan of Andrab district.

AFF statement read, "The Taliban are going to attack again after collecting the bodies of its killed fighters.”