INSUBCONTINENT EXCLUSIVE:
military said the May 24 meeting involved commanders from different Afghan provinces
(AFP)
More than 50 senior Taliban
commanders were killed in an artillery strike on a meeting in Afghanistan's southern province of Helmand, a U.S
military spokesman said on Wednesday, as fighting continues across the country.The attack on a meeting of commanders in the district of Musa
Qala in Helmand, one of the heartlands of the Taliban insurgency, was a significant blow to the insurgents, said Lt
Martin O'Donnell, spokesman for U.S
forces in Afghanistan."It's certainly a notable strike," he said, adding that several other senior and lower level commanders had been
killed during operations over a 10-day period this month.The Taliban dismissed the report as "propaganda" and said the attack had hit two
civilian houses in Musa Qala, killing five civilians and wounding three."This was a civilian residential area, which had no connection with
the Taliban," spokesman Qari Yousaf Ahmadi said in a statement.The U.S
military said the May 24 meeting involved commanders from different Afghan provinces, including neighbouring Farah, where Taliban fighters
briefly threatened to overrun the provincial capital this month."We think the meeting was to plan next steps," O'Donnell said
While the strike by an artillery rocket system would disrupt Taliban operations, it would not necessarily mean any interruption to the
fighting, he said.Details of last week's operation emerged as fighting continued in other parts of Afghanistan, where the Taliban, aiming to
restore their version of hardline Islamic law, launched their annual spring offensive last month.In Loghar province, east of the capital
Kabul, the Taliban claimed an attack on a police station in the provincial capital Pul-e Alam which killed three police and wounded 12,
among them four police and eight civilians.Shahpoor Ahmadzai, a spokesman for the provincial governor, said three attackers who sought to
enter the police station in the early morning hours triggered a three-hour gunbattle that ended when all three were killed.Elsewhere, three
civilians were killed and 13 wounded by an explosion in the southern city of Kandahar that appeared to have targeted a mechanics' workshop
repairing Afghan army vehicles, a spokesman for the provincial governor said.© Thomson Reuters 2018(Except for the headline, this story has
not been edited by TheIndianSubcontinent staff and is published from a syndicated feed.)
