KABUL — Scores of civilians have fled fighting in
Afghanistan's Panjshir Valley after an insurgent group launched an offensive
against Taliban forces, residents said Saturday.
اضافة اعلان
The Panjshir Valley is famed for being a site of resistance
by Afghans against Soviet forces in the 1980s and as a base for rebels opposed
to Taliban rule during the Islamists' first stint in power in the late 1990s.
The
National Resistance Front (NRF) were the last to hold
out against the Taliban's takeover of the country last year by retreating to
the valley.
Headed by the son of late anti-Taliban commander
Ahmad Shah Massoud, NRF forces last week announced an offensive against the Taliban —
their first since the hardline Islamists seized power in August.
Both sides claim to have killed dozens of each other's
fighters in recent days.
"We could only pick up one or two items of
clothing," Lutfullah Bari told AFP, saying he fled with dozens of
families.
"Like us ... (the families) are now living with their
relatives in different areas of Kabul," he added.
Farid Ahmad, a father-of-10, said he left his district with
several other people because of fighting.
Another civilian, Aimal Rahimi, said people "are afraid
and escaping to save their lives".
Taliban commanders in Panjshir however told AFP the fighting
had stopped.
"They (NRF fighters) have escaped to the
mountains," said Abdul Hamid Khurasani, head of the Taliban's elite Badri
unit in Panjshir.
"The situation is now normal and peaceful."
The NRF said their offensive would continue across 12
provinces where their forces had a presence, mostly in the north of
Afghanistan.
Massoud, the group's most revered figure and known as the
"Lion of Panjshir", was assassinated in 2001 by
Al-Qaeda, two days
before the September 11 attacks in the US.
His son, Ahmad Massoud, has since picked up the mantle
against Taliban forces, denouncing the Islamist regime as
"illegitimate".
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