Washington, May 1 (TNS): The Taliban and other insurgent groups are gaining control over increasing numbers of the Afghan population and the strength of local security forces has declined sharply, a United States government watchdog warned on Tuesday.
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The latest report from the Special Inspector General for Afghanistan Reconstruction (SIGAR) paints a grim picture of the security situation in the war-torn country and comes even as the Pentagon asserts that Afghan troops and US-led NATO forces are making steady progress in the gruelling, 16.5-year-old conflict.
It also comes on the heels of another deadly day in the capital, when twin blasts killed at least 25 people, including Agency France-Press chief photographer for Afghanistan Shah Marai and eight other journalists.
According to SIGAR, the strength of the Afghan Security Forces has dropped by about 10 percent over the course of a year falling to a total size of 296,409 personnel in the army and police forces as of January 31.
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Militants including the Taliban and the Islamic State group have stepped up their attacks on beleaguered Afghan troops and police in recent months, sapping morale already hit by desertions and corruption.
US forces used to provide SIGAR with the number of Afghan troops being killed — the figures were more than 5,000 each year — but that information is now classified at the request of the Afghan government.
At the same time, the Taliban and other insurgent groups now control or influence 14.5 percent of Afghanistan’s 407 districts — the highest level since SIGAR started recording such data in late 2015.
The government, meanwhile, controls 56.3 percent of the districts, with the remainder considered “contested.”
The varying population sizes of each district mean that since August 2016, Afghan government control over its people has decreased.
“The overall trend for the insurgency is rising control over the population (from nine percent in August 2016 to 12 percent in January 2018),” the SIGAR report states.
