MAIWAND, Afghanistan, Nov 6, 2020 (BSS/AFP) – The dry and dusty village of
Aziz Abad sits on the frontline of Afghanistan’s war and is currently under
government control — but only just.
Every night, 20-year-old paramilitary policeman Zainullah and his
colleagues must seek refuge in filthy trenches at their battered outpost on
the edge of the village while insurgents target them at an increasingly
fierce tempo.
“The Taliban do not want peace,” said Zainullah, who like many Afghans only
goes by one name.
“They are detonating landmines, roadside bombs, sticky bombs and launching
rocket attacks.”
The village is located in Maiwand district — the scene of a notorious
British military defeat in the 19th century — in Kandahar province, where
the insurgents have kept control in some rural areas despite 19 years of war.
The insurgents are close to Zainullah’s makeshift base, where barbed wire
fencing and shredded sandbags offer scant protection.
A walkie-talkie crackles as a police officer listens in on Taliban
transmissions — he says the militants are discussing the unrecognised
vehicles AFP is travelling in.
After months of US cajoling and concessions, the Taliban finally agreed to
start peace talks with the Afghan government in September, but the Islamist
hardliners have only stepped up attacks in the weeks since.
“Lots of our colleagues have been killed and many others wounded,”
Zainullah said.
In late September, Taliban fighters crossed the frontline, reaching a
nearby village called Deh Qubat before being pushed back.
“The Taliban were hiding behind walls, in houses and in the mosque. They
were everywhere,” recalled Atta Jan, a 28-year-old farmer, who was having
breakfast when militants stormed his street in Deh Qubat, a 35-minute drive
from Aziz Abad.
Sardar, a farmer in Aziz Abad, said his mosque no longer offers evening
prayers because of the volatile security situation.
Walls in his village have been destroyed by fighting and the roads are all
but abandoned.
Separated by the war, some of Sardar’s family live under the Taliban,
divided by a no man’s land of desert.
“All our families are split… for the past 18 years I have not seen their
happiness or sorrow, I have not attended their funerals,” he said.
– Dwindling US support –
The peace talks came after the Taliban and Washington signed a deal in
February, with the US agreeing to withdraw all foreign forces in exchange for
security guarantees and a Taliban promise to start talks.
“Since the talks began, the fighting has intensified every day,” said Ahmad
Ikhlas, a police commander with hearing damage from a recent Taliban truck
bombing.
“One of our colleagues died in the explosion a couple of weeks ago. After
the blast, I became deaf.”
Such scenes are playing out across Afghanistan, with the Taliban harassing
Afghan army and police bases and launching large-scale attacks, including one
on Lashkar Gah, the capital of neighbouring Helmand province.
The US Special Inspector General for Afghanistan Reconstruction (SIGAR)
said in a report Thursday that overall attacks against Afghan forces and
civilians were up 50 percent in the three months to the end of September,
compared to the previous quarter.
And where Afghan forces around Aziz Abad could once rely on US military
support, now they must increasingly fend for themselves.
“Now we don’t get air support,” grumbled Zainullah.
President Donald Trump has said he wants US troops out of Afghanistan as
quickly as possible, and the Pentagon has seemed reluctant to strike the
Taliban, publicly acknowledging only a handful of strikes since February.
So for many residents in Maiwand, which has seen constant violence since
the Taliban’s ouster following the US-led invasion of 2001, peace seems
unimaginable.
“The Taliban throw dust in the eyes of Americans — they make some deal
with them but do not want peace,” said Khalil, a 26-year-old police officer
who helped defend Deh Qubat.
He said he has relatives fighting on both sides of the conflict, and many
who have died because of it.
Progress seen in other parts of the country since 2001 have hardly
materialised in this unstable region. The first school for girls in Aziz Abad
is still under construction.
Many of the people AFP spoke to see no end to Taliban influence, and the
insurgent group has made clear it expects to be back in power before long.
Fourteen-year-old Malalai, who is already engaged, said she had missed her
window to get an education.
“If I start now, I will be too old when I graduate,” she said.
For teenage cousins Mohibullah and Rafiullah, living on the frontline
village of Deh Qubat has meant a lifetime of fear.
“Every night, there is fighting. My heart says peace will not come,”
Mohibullah said.