| Submit your comments on this article |
| Afghanistan |
| Afghan Army Soldiers Clash With Taliban |
| 2003-04-10 |
| E.F.L. Soldiers of the new Afghan national army battled resurgent Taliban fighters in eastern Afghanistan on Wednesday, killing a former Taliban minister in a four-hour gunbattle, state television reported. The former minister of borders and tribal affairs, Ammanullah, was killed during a firefight in Orgun, 108 miles south of Kabul. Several other suspected Taliban fighters also were killed, and four government soldiers were injured, state TV said. Ammanullah used only one name. That'll save space on the tombstone. The latest round of factional fighting in the north broke out Tuesday in Maimana, the capital of Faryab province. At least four combatants were killed and four wounded during clashes between forces loyal to ethnic Uzbek warlord Gen. Abdul Rashid Dostum and those of his Tajik rival, Gen. Atta Mohammed, said Qudrat Ullah Hormat, spokesman for Atta Mohammed. Hormat said four of Mohammed's soldiers were killed and four injured in an exchange of automatic weapons fire. Earlier Wednesday, Afghan authorities dispatched a team of mediators to the area to resolve simmering tensions between the two rival factions, said Sayed Noor Ullah, one of Dostum's senior officials. It was not clear what sparked the fighting. Ullah characterized Tuesday's skirmish as a "local dispute" between two commanders — Dostum's Mohammad Hashim and Mohammed's Gulam Farooq. "local dispute" means they stopped short of heavy artillery, so far. |
| Posted by:Steve |
| #1 "mediators" Seems to me they should have given them a couple of days to kill each other,then go in and mop up the rest. |
| Posted by: raptor 2003-04-11 09:10:41 |