At least seven policemen were killed in an overnight Taliban attack against security checkpoints in Afghanistan’s western Badghis province, official said Saturday.
Mohammad Naser Nazari, a provincial councilman, said that three other security forces were wounded during the attack in Qadis district.
The Taliban did not comment on the attack.
The Afghan defense ministry said Saturday that two separate airstrikes conducted Friday night by coalition forces in coordination with Afghan forces killed at least 43 militants from the ISIS group in eastern Kunar province.
The statement said the airstrikes targeted ISIS in Chapara district and killed several Pakistani and Uzbek nationals.
Both the Taliban and ISIS are active in eastern Afghanistan, especially in Kunar and neighboring Nangarhar provinces, which border Pakistan.
The United States has about 14,000 troops in Afghanistan as part of a NATO-led mission, known as Resolute Support, that is training and assisting Afghan security forces in their battle against Taliban fighters and extremist groups such as ISIS and al Qaeda.
US special peace envoy for Afghanistan Zalmay Khalilzad, an Afghan-born US diplomat, entered a sixth round of talks with the Taliban in Qatar this week in a bid to end America’s longest war.
The envoy should stop calling on Taliban militants to lay down their arms and tell the United States to end the use of force instead, the Taliban said on Friday.
“In our opening session, I underscored to the Talibs that the Afghan people, who are their brothers & sisters, want this war to end,” Khalilzad said in a tweet. “It is time to put down arms, stop the violence, & embrace peace.”
Taliban spokesman Zabihullah Mujahid issued a series of sharp tweets in response.
“@US4AfghanPeace (Khalilzad’s twitter handle) should forget about the idea of us putting down our arms,” he said.
“Instead of such fantasies, he should drive the idea home (to the US) about ending the use of force and incurring further human and financial losses for the decaying Kabul administration.”
After five rounds of talks, Khalilzad reported some progress towards an accord on withdrawing US troops and on how the Taliban would prevent extremists from using Afghanistan to launch attacks.
The Taliban insist that talks cannot move ahead until foreign forces leave.
