By Zabihullah Tamanna
KABUL
Security operations in Afghanistan’s eastern Nangarhar have left 55 Taliban dead, Afghan officials said.
Four days of operations around Dor Baba district resulted in three Taliban wounded, Nangarhar police spokesman Hussain Mashriqiwal said Thursday.
He added: "Dor Baba district bordering Pakistan was known as a peaceful area in the past 13 years. We got a report revealing that a group of militants had crossed the border and [were] taking positions in the area to create law and order problems.
"We have lost two soldiers during the operations. The anti-terrorist operation continues and our forces have been collecting and piling bodies of militants, the majority of them holding Pakistan national identity cards."
Taliban spokesman Zabihuallah Mujahid confirmed the clashes, saying the Taliban had killed three Afghan soldiers, injured five and destroyed an armored vehicle.
In recent years the Taliban has moved into previously peaceful parts of Afghanistan.
Faryab province in the northwest has become a hotbed of Taliban activity over the past two years with Uzbek and Chechen dominated groups destabilized the province, known as the door to northern Afghanistan.
In the province’s capital, Maimanna, militants killed three police and captured another Wednesday night and at least one child was killed and 18 other civilians injured as a bicycle bomb detonated next to a police van in the city Thursday.
The UN human rights mission in Afghanistan reported Thursday that more than 1,560 civilians were killed and nearly 3,290 others wounded in Taliban-led attacks during the first half of the year.
In Kabul, the Afghan security force said it had foiled an assassination attempt on an Afghan member of parliament Thursday morning when a bomb was found by his house.
In neighboring Parwan province, at least two U.S. soldiers were injured as an improvised explosive device struck their armored vehicle Wednesday night, Bagram district chief Abdul Shakor Qodoos said. The Taliban claimed five U.S. soldiers were killed.
Taliban militants have intensified their war against the Afghan government, aiming to seize ground as international troops withdraw by the end of the year.
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