U.S. hits Taliban with strikes in Afghanistan's Sangin

USA aircraft carried out two attacks in Sangin, the district in southern Afghanistan overrun by Taliban fighters this week, officials said as the battle for the strategic province of Helmand continued.

Afghan forces scrambled to beat back the Taliban from the city of Sangin as the insurgents claimed to have captured almost the entire opium-rich district. The turmoil in Helmand, the deadliest province for British and USA forces in Afghanistan over the past decade, underscores a rapidly unravelling security situation in Afghanistan mandating a refocus for global troops still stationed in the country.

Islamabad, Dec 25 Pakistan's powerful army chief General Raheel Sharif will visit Afghanistan on Sunday to discuss peace and security and possible resumption of peace talks between the Afghan government and the Taliban, the military said today. "We are still strong".

Wilson Center South Asian and Afghan history specialist Benjamin Hopkins linked the Taliban insurgency's latest military offensive with wavering foreign support.

The town has become a major centre for the Taliban's insurgency, as it is links Lashkah Gah, the capital of Helmand, to the province's northern districts.

US President Barack Obama has said US forces would stay in Afghanistan after next year because of the weakness of the Afghan army and the growing terrorist threat.

President Ghani further added that the policy of the Afghan government is clear and reiterated his last year's remarks, saying that Afghanistan is engaged in an undeclared war with Pakistan during the past 14 years.

But civilian and military officials said Sangin remained in government hands after the United States conducted two airstrikes overnight, and Afghan military helicopters dropped food and ammunition to soldiers and police who had been surrounded and trapped inside the district army base for days.

This month marks a year since the US-led North Atlantic Treaty Organisation mission in Afghanistan transitioned into an Afghan-led operation, with allied nations assisting in training local forces.

Stuart Gordon, a Helmand expert at the Chatham House think tank, told Britain's Press Association news agency that Sangin held a special significance to the British as more than 100 British troops had been killed there. "They are not deployed in a combat role and will not deploy outside the camp", the statement said.

"The problem is where the Afghan forces have to fend for themselves", he said. "It seems meant to demonstrate that the former Coalition partners still care about Afghanistan", Williams College Afghan Media Project Director David Edwards observed.

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