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Roundup: Over 2,000 families displaced due to recent fighting in N. Afghan Kunduz province

Xinhua, May 8, 2017 Adjust font size:

More than 2,000 families have been displaced over the past week due to Taliban's intensified militancy in northern Afghanistan's Kunduz province, a local official said on Monday.

"Up to 2,058 families have fled their houses for safer places to escape the war over the past nearly one week from Qala-e-Zal and its vicinity," head of Refugees and Repatriation department in Kunduz province, Ghulam Sakhi Rasouli told Xinhua on Monday.

He also added that 1,850 families have been displaced due to the war in Qala-e-Zal district over the past three days.

The strategically important Qala-e-Zal district of Kunduz province along the border with Tajikistan fell to Taliban fighters on Saturday.

All the displaced families have migrated to the neighboring Baghlan, Takhar or Kabul and some are living with their families in Kunduz city, Rasouli asserted.

Residents in Kunduz province are worrying that the Taliban onslaught and increasing militancy would force more families to leave their houses for safer places.

More families would flee to escape the war, a resident of Kunduz province, Payenda Mohammad said Monday.

The Taliban militants fighting the government to regain power have intensified their activities since launching their so-called spring offensive on April 28.

The influx of displaced families in Kunduz city is tangible as the newly arrived families are asking for places where they can live, another Kunduz resident, Rahmatullah told Xinhua.

Presently more than 500,000 people, according to officials, have been living as Internally Displaced People (IDPs) in Afghanistan. The number of IDPs would further increase due to the ongoing war and insurgency in the country, officials believe.

Zabihullah Majahid, who claims to speak for the Taliban outfit in contact with media, has confirmed the capture of Qala-e-Zal district and said the armed militants would spare no efforts to overrun more areas in and around Kunduz city.

Taliban militants who had briefly captured Kunduz city, capital of Kunduz province in 2015 and 2016 respectively, according to local officials, have been mounting pressure to overrun the important city once again to destabilize neighboring Baghlan and Takhar provinces and adjoining areas. Endit