Three Taliban sources told Reuters on Friday evening that the movement now controls all of Afghanistan.

On Friday, the anti-Taliban resistance announced its participation in a “violent” fight against fighters besieging the Panjshir Valley (east), the only center of the armed opposition to the new Afghan regime.

“There is heavy fighting in Panjshir,” said Ali Maysam Nazari, a spokesman for the National Resistance Front, which includes anti-Taliban militias and former members of the Afghan forces.

“Masoud is busy defending the valley,” he added, referring to Ahmed Massoud, son of Commander Ahmed Shah Massoud, a figure in the resistance to the Soviets and the Taliban who was assassinated by al-Qaeda on September 9, 2001.

The National Resistance Front initially reported heavy losses in the ranks of the Taliban, stressing that it repelled the attack. On the other hand, accounts of pro-Taliban social media platforms report that 31 Panjshir resisters were killed.

The Italian NGO “Emergency” said on Twitter that it had received “four wounded and four dead (…) as a result of the fighting in Gulbahar” at the entrances to the Panjshir Valley, in its hospital in Kabul.

“Taliban forces gathered around the entrance to the valley but were ambushed and incurred losses,” wrote Martin van Bieglert of the Afghan Analysts Network.

“While it seemed that the two sides were mainly seeking to strike to strengthen their position in the negotiations, without starting an all-out battle, the Taliban began calling for reinforcements from other states,” she added.

The front, which expressed its hope for dialogue with the Taliban, pledged to defend the valley surrounded by hundreds of fighters from the Islamic movement. But these talks failed, according to the Taliban, who on Wednesday called on the resistance fighters to surrender without a fight.

“The Taliban offered to allocate two seats to the National Front of Resistance in the government they want to form while we demand a better future for Afghanistan,” Ahmed Masoud said on Wednesday. “We didn’t even think about” her offer, he said, estimating that the Taliban “chosen to go the path of war.”

Panjshir, the long-standing anti-Taliban stronghold, is a closed and inaccessible valley in the heart of the Hindu Kush mountains, whose southern end lies about 80 kilometers north of the capital Kabul, where former Vice President Amrullah Saleh, the Taliban’s archenemy, took refuge.

AFP