The death rate among Afghan security forces soared last year, as the Kabul government’s overall control of the country dropped significantly, an official US watchdog said in a report Wednesday.
According to the US government’s Special Inspector General for Afghanistan Reconstruction (SIGAR), 6,785 Afghan soldiers and police officers were killed between January 1 and November 12, with another 11,777 wounded.
That’s an increase of about 35 percent from all of 2015, when some 5,000 security forces were killed.
Afghan police and army units took over from NATO the task of providing security for the country in 2015.
Their first year was something of a disaster, the nadir coming when the regional capital Kunduz in northern Afghanistan was briefly captured by the Taliban.
The Pentagon, however, insists the Afghan National Defense and Security Forces (ANDSF) are improving and points to successful efforts to repel Taliban attacks on regional capitals.
Most of the fatalities among the ANDSF came from “direct-fire” assaults, meaning local troops were directly attacked by the Taliban and other insurgent groups, instead of dying in roadside bomb and mine blasts.
In addition to the high death rate in the ANDSF, the report also found that the number of Afghan districts under insurgent control or influence are increasing.
US Forces Afghanistan reported that about 57.2 percent of the country’s 407 districts were under Afghan government control or influence as of November 15, the report states.
That marks a drop of 6.2 percentage points from the 63.4 percent reported in late August, and a nearly 15-point drop since November 2015.
Source: AFP
