A four-day assault by the Taliban on a key provincial capital has killed about 100 Afghan security forces, the country’s defense minister, Tariq Shah Bahrami, said Monday. Twenty to 30 civilians have been killed in the fighting, he said.

It is a major show of force by the Taliban as capturing Ghazni in the east of the country would cut off a key highway linking Kabul to the traditional insurgent heartland in the south.

The militants' multipronged militant assault overwhelmed Ghazni, a strategic city of 270,000 people barely 75 miles from the capital, Kabul. That so many fighters were able to mass and threaten the key town piles pressure on the government of President Ashraf Ghani.

The United States has sent military advisers to aid Afghan forces. The spokesman for U.S. forces in Afghanistan, Lt. Col. Martin O'Donnell, told NBC News that the Americans had conducted 24 airstrikes in the city since Friday — 16 on Sunday alone.

In total, 1,000 local troops have been sent to the city, according to Bahrami, and 194 insurgents, including 12 commanders, were killed.

Afghan interior minister, Wais Ahmad Barmak, said Taliban fighters were hiding in mosques and homes in Ghazni and were using residents to use as a human shield.

The attack on Ghazni began Friday, with insurgents infiltrating homes and slipping out into the night to attack Afghan forces.

Source: NBC News

BDST: 1103 HRS, AUG 14, 2018
SI