By Shadi Khan Saif

KABUL

The UN Assistance Mission in Afghanistan (UNAMA) has documented 1,943 civilian casualties (600 deaths and 1,343 injured) within the first quarter of the current year.

UNAMA noted a 5 percent increase this year in female casualties (52 deaths and 143 injuries) and a 29 percent increase in child casualties (161 deaths and 449 injuries) compared to the first three months of 2015.

"In the first quarter of 2016, almost one third of civilian casualties were children," Danielle Bell, UNAMA’s human rights director, said.

"If fighting persists near schools, playgrounds, homes and clinics, and parties continue to use explosive weapons in those areas… the appalling numbers of children killed and maimed will continue," she warned.

The report comes at a time when the Taliban are attempting to overrun several different parts of the country, especially in the north, while the government is bent on eliminating the insurgents for good.

Government forces claimed to have killed over 90 militants across the country within the last 48 hours.

Most of these were killed when the Taliban attempted to overrun northern Kunduz’s Dasht-e-Archi and Khanabad districts in a bid to repeat military victories achieved in the same area last year.

The Afghan military, meanwhile, is currently engaged in a nationwide offensive ("Operation Shafaq") in an effort to wipe out the militants.

The Taliban, for their part, are launching back-to-back attacks on security checkpoints in remote districts and on highways in mountainous areas, claiming fresh successes on an almost daily basis.

"Even if a conflict intensifies, it does not have to be matched by corresponding civilian suffering, provided parties take their international humanitarian law and human rights obligations seriously," UNAMA chief Nicholas Haysom said Sunday.

"Failure to respect humanitarian obligations will result in more suffering in a nation that has suffered enough," he added.

According to UNAMA, actions by "anti-government elements" have caused at least 60 percent of recent civilian casualties, while pro-government forces were responsible for at least 19 percent.

Sixteen percent of civilian casualties, meanwhile, were the result of fighting between anti-government elements and pro-government forces, which could not be attributed to either party, UNAMA noted.