Kabul: Afghanistan’s President Ashraf Ghani informed that approximately 30,000 Afghan soldiers were killed in the war with terrorists since the NATO and the United States’ militaries handed over the responsibility to the local military and security agencies in 2015. President Ghani’s disclosure endorses the reports which state, the Taliban conflict in Afghanistan is consistently intensifying. The report named ‘Costs of War’, published only last week, claimed that the Afghanistan war in the last 17 years, has taken a toll of nearly 150,000 lives.

During his election campaign, Donald Trump had announced that he would recall the military from Afghanistan if he was elected as the President. Nevertheless, after coming to power, Trump had to change his stance. He said that the picture appears different from the President’s Office and that he had accepted the inevitability of the Afghanistan war against terrorists. After that, the US military increased the scope of their operations in the fight against the Taliban in Afghanistan. Even so, a significant rise in the incidents of Taliban targeting the Afghani military and security agencies was observed in the same period.

In 2015, five thousand personnel from the Afghan military and security agencies lost their lives. However, a consistent rise is witnessed in the casualties in the following years of 2016, 2017 and the current one. The recent report of the US’ SIGAR (Special Inspector General for Afghanistan Reconstruction), highlighted the increase in casualties of Afghani soldiers in summer this year, over the previous ones. Also, US Secretary of Defense James Mattis informed that more than 1,000 soldiers had been killed in the months of August-September this year.

On these grounds, Afghanistan’s President Ghani has once again drawn attention to the number of the casualties suffered by the Afghan security forces in the war against Taliban. The death toll of the Afghani soldiers quoted in Ghani’s statement appears to be more than the one mentioned in the other reports. The statistics only go on to underline the incapability of the Afghani security agencies in fighting Taliban. Moreover, the constant Taliban attacks in Ghazni, Takhar and Farah provinces in the last one month only bears testimony to the fact.

Therefore, the situation indicates that the NATO and the United States may soon have to increase their military deployment in Afghanistan.

हिंदी     मराठी

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