Fighting in the northern Afghan city of Kunduz has led to a “rapidly deteriorating” humanitarian situation, officials said yesterday, leaving thousands of people with limited access to food, water, or medical care.
Street-to-street gun battles have continued for four days after Taliban militants slipped past the city’s defences on Monday.
Government troops, backed by US special forces and air strikes, have repeatedly declared that they are in control of the city, but residents report that heavy fighting has forced many people to flee.
The fighting has forced as many as 10,000 people from their homes in Kunduz, the United Nations reported, with those who remain facing serious water, food and electricity shortages, as well as threats from the fighting.
“Many families were unable to bring their possessions with them and are in a precarious position,” Dominic Parker, head of the UN’s humanitarian coordination office, said in a statement. “We have had reports that some families have been forced to sleep out in the open and many have few food supplies.”
Among those fleeing Kunduz are about two-thirds of the staff at the city’s main public hospital, which was struck by several rockets and small arms fire, said Marzia Yaftali Salaam, a doctor.
The 200-bed public hospital is the main provider of medical care in Kunduz after a more advanced trauma centre run by Medecins Sans Frontieres was destroyed by an American air strike last year.
In the past three days, the hospital has been inundated by at least 210 patients, many of them civilians, including women and children, wounded in the fighting, Salaam said.
“Many of the wounded had to be carried to clinics in surrounding districts and private clinics in the city,” she said. “If the situation remains the same, we may be forced to halt our services.”
During a lull in the fighting on Wednesday, nearly 50 casualties were rushed to the hospital in the span of a few hours, said Hameed Alam, head of the public health department in Kunduz.
The US military command in Kabul said Afghan forces are “defeating Taliban attempts to take Kunduz,” with reinforcements on the way and commandos continuing to clear “isolated pockets” of Taliban fighters.
The Taliban, who ruled Afghanistan with an iron fist from 1996 to 2001, are seeking to topple the Western-backed government in Kabul and reimpose Islamic rule.
“There is fighting in every street and the situation is critical,” said Ismail Kawasi, a spokesman for the Public Health Ministry in Kabul.
Additional medical supplies and personnel were positioned in neighbouring provinces, but they must wait for the fighting to subside before they can be flown to Kunduz, he said.
Taliban militants in the past days have kidnapped more than 100 travellers in two Afghan provinces.
Taliban militants in the past 3 days have kidnapped 80 to 90 local civilians in Afghanistan’s northern province of Badakhshan, officials said on Thursday.
“Taliban are demanding that the government allows fuel transportation to the gold mine under the militants’ control in Raghistan district,”
Mahbubur-Rahman Talat, a provincial council member from Badakhshan said.
He said the commuters are all from Darwaz district who were abducted in Raghistan and efforts by tribal elders are underway to release them but “no effort has been made by the Afghan government so far”. Sakhi Dad Hairdari, a police official in Badakhshan, said the reason for the kidnapping is unknown and efforts by the government are underway to release them.
Badakhshan, a relatively safe province in the past, has been a hotbed for Taliban activity in the last couple of years.
A total of 25 passengers from the central province of Bamyan were also kidnapped by unknown gunmen in the province of Wardak on Wednesday.
“The commuters were abducted in Jalrez district and reason for the abduction is unknown,” Mohamed Sardar Bakhtyari, a provincial council member in Wardak, said yesterday adding that no efforts have been made to release those kidnapped yet.
A local official in Jalrez told Bakhtar News Agency (BNA)
that Taliban militants are responsible for the abduction case.
Jalrez, an area heavily contested, has been the scene of numerous kidnappings in the past few years.
Taliban have also besieged Kunduz, a key city in northern Afghanistan, for the past four days, forcing thousands of families to flee the area.