Over 100 Officers and Soldiers Killed in Crucial Afghan City in 3 Days
Over 100 Officers and Soldiers Killed in Crucial Afghan City in 3 Days by Rod Nordland, Fahim Abed and Mujib Mashal – New York Times
KABUL, Afghanistan - More than 100 police officers and soldiers have been killed in the southeastern Afghan city of Ghazni in three days, a hospital official said on Sunday, as fighting continued in the strategic city, where Taliban insurgents have seized control of most neighborhoods.
The insurgents have also begun spreading into districts outside Ghazni city, two of which fell to them overnight, according to reports from local residents and Afghan officials.
Baz Mohammad Hemat, the director of the Ghazni Hospital, said by telephone that 113 bodies had been taken to the hospital, along with 142 wounded, most of them in uniform.
“We’re running out of hospital rooms; we are using corridors and available space everywhere,” he said. “Fighting is quite close to the hospital. The situation is really bad here. We’re receiving more and more wounded and dead every hour.”
The death toll appeared sure to rise, with numerous reports of bodies left unrecovered around the city. An additional 100 Afghan soldiers and police officers have been killed in fighting in other parts of the country over the past two days, officials said, a remarkably high death toll on top of the violence in Ghazni city.
The fall of Ghazni would be the Taliban’s most important victory yet…