MoI: Afghan Forces To Launch Fresh Winter-Offensive Against Insurgents

As war games go, the Ministry of Interior (MoI) says that the Afghan National Army and Police forces movements will increase against terrorists in winter season.

Officials in MoI declared that with Afghan flags rippling in every parts of the country, the military operations will be more in those areas that the insurgents have presence.

“Our movements will increase in the winter season which most of them would be in areas that have previously witnessed insurgent attacks,” Sidiq Sidiqi, MoI spokesman said.

The current year was a bloody and deadly year for Afghanistan that the armed Taliban group tired to launch more of its attacks on the villages and districts of the country.

The 2015 fighting season between the Taliban and Afghan security forces is turning out to be the bloodiest on record since 2001.

Insecurity has significantly increased throughout the country, civilian deaths have shot up, and the Afghan security forces are taking large, and potentially unsustainable casualties.

The pressure from the calendar apparently led Afghanistan to begin preparing operation plans for the three months winter-offensive.

Heavy snows and freezing temperatures could arrive as soon as next two months.

Meanwhile, Afghan army commanders have also stress on winter operations to destroy and eliminate terrorist groups.

“We have our own projections and our operational plans in three months of winter season,” said Gen. Abdul Rahman, deputy of defense ministry’s department of strategic public relations.

However, winter will paralyze movement by most Afghans in the hills, including both the anti-Taliban fighters and the millions of Afghan civilians who are liable to face acute hardship or death in a harsh winter coming after the longest drought in the country’s memory.

In October 2015, President Barack Obama announced to keep around 5,500 troops in Afghanistan beyond 2016.

This comes as the Afghan government tries to wind down its military operations against terrorist groups; which Afghanistan’s future remains precarious at best.

Reported by Marofa Zaki

Edited by Muhammad Zakaria