Unmanned war: US drone kills five in Nangarhar

Dead include local Taliban commander

JALALABAD: A remotely-piloted US aircraft killed five Taliban insurgents Afghanistan’s Nangarhar province that borders Pakistan late Saturday night, officials said on Sunday.

The strike took place in the Marsangi area of Nangarhar’s Lal Pur district, Afghanistan’s Khaama news agency quoted a spokesman for the province’s police headquarters as saying.

“Five Taliban were killed and two wounded in the drone attack,” police spokesman Lt-Col Hazrat Hussain Mashriqiwal said. “Those killed in the strike include a local Taliban commander,” he added.

Talking to Pajhwok news agency, Mashriqiwal said the five militants were travelling in a police pick-up truck when the drone attacked them.

Nangarhar has turned into a hotbed of Taliban insurgency in recent months. According to Afghan officials, both the Taliban and militants proclaiming their allegiance to the Islamic State have stepped up their activities and recruitment in the province.

The militants have also set up prisons in at least one district of Nangarhar. “Militants are holding several people captive in three detention centres in Achin district,” the district’s governor told reporters recently.

Published in The Express Tribune, September 14^th,  2015.