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Security Report Shows Improvement In ANSF Campaigns
Reflecting on a very busy year so far for the embattled Afghan National Security Forces (ANSF) against insurgents, a new TOLOnews security report has found the ANSF maintained their military strength over insurgents during March and April this year, which led to major defeat on a number of instances for insurgents.

"Although the insurgents increased their operations and activities by 77 percent, the Afghan security forces retaliated against attacks effectively - in 200 counter-insurgency attacks," the report says.

The report also covered the overall death toll among the armed opponents and the ANSF.

But according to the report, Afghan forces still do not have the ability to lead large scale operations on several fronts simultaneously.

Based on the report, during March and April, ANSF launched a number of sophisticated operations including Shafaq operation while Taliban also announced their spring offensive, code named Omari.

However, the report speaks of improvement within the ranks of ANSF in their battle against the insurgents, but the Taliban also used all available resources to increase attacks on security forces and gain ground, indicating a substantial rise in Taliban attacks.

"After announcing their spring offensive, Taliban increased their attacks. The group conducted 131 attacks on security forces while the figure was around 50 attacks during the first two months of 2016," the report stated.

"Taliban carried out guerrilla attacks and they tolerated a massive toll during operations and were defeated. If they continue on the same track, they will lose soon," military analyst Mirza Mohammad Yarmand said.

"During March and April, the Taliban tried to change their war tactics and they focused on small operations and widespread attacks. The attacks were totally different from the attacks during this period in 2015," the report further added.

The report found that ANSF was still on the defensive and they have not managed to take the war to the Taliban. While the Shafaq operation is still ongoing, Taliban managed to infiltrate in Baghlan's Dand-e-Ghori and Dand-e-Shahabuddin districts.

"They (Taliban) faced one of the biggest defeats in the past 50 days in Kunduz, they were defeated after attacking Kunduz," Sediq Sediqqi, an interior ministry spokesman said.

"Overall 1,280 security events were recorded in March and April which shows an 18 percent rise compared to first two months of 2016, the report read.

During March and April, the militants launched 181 attacks while the security forces launched 660 retaliatory attacks to foil these attacks.

"We are still undertaking our planned operations which include offensives, we plan and conduct the operation," Dawlat Waziri, a spokesman for the ministry of defense said on Thursday.

Casualties among the armed opponents also increased by 15 percent during March and April 2016 compared to the same period in 2015.

The report finds that 447 Afghan soldiers were killed during March and April while 145 civilians also lost their lives during the violence.

"During March and April the insurgents abducted 94 civilians and 44 military personnel," the report said.

In February, Afghanistan's border regions once again came under cross border attacks from Pakistani army.

The eastern Nangarhar province remained on top of the list of most insecure provinces during March and April.

Video report at the link
Posted by: badanov 2016-05-13
http://www.rantburg.com/poparticle.php?ID=455803