{"id":11914,"date":"2018-08-18T02:29:46","date_gmt":"2018-08-18T02:29:46","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/qatar-news.org\/qatarnewsEn\/?p=11914"},"modified":"2018-08-18T02:29:46","modified_gmt":"2018-08-18T02:29:46","slug":"afghan-president-ashraf-ghani-visits-ghazni-after-taliban-siege","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/qatar-news.org\/qatarnewsEn\/?p=11914","title":{"rendered":"Afghan President Ashraf Ghani visits Ghazni after Taliban siege"},"content":{"rendered":"
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Ashraf Ghani,\u00a0<\/span>Afghanistan’s president, has visited the embattled southeastern city of Ghazni, a week after the Taliban<\/a> launched an attack and infiltrated deep into the key provincial capital.<\/p>\n

The five-day battle<\/a> with the Taliban in Ghazni killed at least 100 members of Afghan security forces and 35 civilians before calm was restored on Wednesday, while a UN report quoted “unverifiable numbers” that put the civilian death toll at more than 200.<\/p>\n

Ghani\u00a0<\/span>met officials on Friday in Ghazni, a central Afghani<\/span>stan<\/a> city on the main highway linking the capital, Kabul, with the south, to assess security. He also met families of the victims.<\/p>\n

In a speech, Ghani said greater security was needed around district capitals, as well as the provincial capital, and questioned the strength of defence trenches dug around vulnerable areas.<\/p>\n

“I am here to help all those who have suffered losses, I am committed to build the city and also do everything to protect Ghazni,” Ghani said.<\/p>\n

“Our soldiers have fought bravely and we stand committed to bringing peace,” he said.<\/p>\n

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In Kabul, the UN office for humanitarian assistance (OCHA) said fighting was continuing on Ghazni’s outskirts.<\/p>\n

In its report, which was released late on Thursday, OCHA said water and electricity have yet to be restored in many areas of the city of 270,000 people.<\/p>\n

Abdul Halim Noori, the head of the Afghan Red Crescent in Ghazni, said six of their teams are still sifting through the rubble in the city, searching for bodies.<\/p>\n

So far, the aid group has retrieved 270 bodies but there was no breakdown or indication how many were Afghan security troops, Taliban fighters or civilians.<\/p>\n

In one home, they found bodies of 11 members of a single family, Noori told The Associated Press.<\/p>\n

Even though they were pushed back from the city, the Taliban still hold sway in much of Ghazni province.<\/p>\n

Elsewhere in Afghanistan on Friday, the Taliban ambushed and killed five local police officers in northern Baghlan province, according to Ekramuddin Sarih, the provincial chief police.<\/p>\n

He said the officers were patrolling on foot near their security post in the provincial capital of Puli Khumri.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n

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\n SOURCE: Al Jazeera and news agencies<\/span><\/p>\n<\/div>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Ashraf Ghani,\u00a0Afghanistan’s president, has visited the embattled southeastern city of Ghazni, a week after the Taliban launched an attack and infiltrated deep into the key provincial capital. The five-day battle with the Taliban in Ghazni killed at least 100 members of Afghan security forces and 35 civilians before calm was restored on Wednesday, while a…<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":10,"featured_media":11915,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[2],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-11914","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-middle_east_news"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/qatar-news.org\/qatarnewsEn\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/11914","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/qatar-news.org\/qatarnewsEn\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/qatar-news.org\/qatarnewsEn\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/qatar-news.org\/qatarnewsEn\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/10"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/qatar-news.org\/qatarnewsEn\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=11914"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/qatar-news.org\/qatarnewsEn\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/11914\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/qatar-news.org\/qatarnewsEn\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/media\/11915"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/qatar-news.org\/qatarnewsEn\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=11914"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/qatar-news.org\/qatarnewsEn\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=11914"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/qatar-news.org\/qatarnewsEn\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=11914"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}