Kabul plotter killed in air strike

Sandeep Dikshit

Tribune News Service

New Delhi, August 28

The US military conducted an over-the-horizon counterterrorism operation in eastern Afghanistan and claimed to have killed an ISIS-K planner of the Kabul bomb blasts, toll of which has crossed 170 and 100 of them remain unidentified.

The drone airstrike in the ISIS-K stronghold in Nangarhar province that also killed the planner’s 14 associates, as far as the US military knows, caused no civilian casualties. The Kabul airport, the scene of the multiple bomb blasts on Thursday, has been taken over by Taliban and sealed.

The US military in 2017 had dropped a powerful bomb in the same province to destroy the ISIS-K high command. The difference this time is the operation was carried out in coordination with the Taliban.

“We share versions of information with Taliban so that they actually make searches.… We think they’ve thwarted some,” said US Central Command chief Gen Kenneth McKenzie.

As the US tries to eliminate the possibility of a similar attack on its soil by exchanging information with Taliban, an experienced Afghan voice said this was not the right way. Claiming that the Taliban was behind the attack to gain control over the airport, former Afghan Vice-President Amrullah Saleh said the US should instead tell Talban it would be culpable for another attack.

Saleh along with Resistance2 forces led by Ahmad Masood were themselves bracing for a Taliban attack on Panjshir valley with very little evidence of any outside support but for a morale boosting statement from Tajikistan President Emomali Rahmon.

“The people have zero trust in Taliban. If they had trust, why are they fleeing Afghanistan? They are seen as a proxy puppet group… That is why when the question of building political consensus comes, they shiver and shake,’’ said Saleh.

The Taliban’s main reason to work with the US is that it will face a fund crunch. Unless the US relents, Taliban’s access will remain blocked to funds from the World Bank, the IMF and UN agencies. Since August 15, the US has also suspended cash transfers to Kabul to bridge its current account deficit.

US rider for Taliban

It advances our interests to engage with Taliban. An Afghan government that keeps its commitments to renounce terrorism and allow people to leave is a government we can work with. — Antony Blinken, US Secretary of State

‘Ploy to control airport’

Claiming that the Taliban was behind the attack to gain control over the airport, former Afghan Vice-President Amrullah Saleh said the US should instead tell Talban it would be culpable for another attack.