Airstrikes by the Afghan Air Force (AAF) have killed at least ten members of the Taliban militant group, including a regional commander, in two provinces in the north, the military says.
A Taliban divisional commander and two of his subordinates were killed after warplanes of the AAF targeted a Taliban hideout in Badghisi village, Khwaja Sabz Posh district in Faryab province, spokesman of the army's 209th Shaheen Corps Hanif Rezai told China’s official Xinhua news agency on Saturday.
According to the spokesman, the airstrike, which was carried out on Friday, also wounded two other members of the group.
Separately on Friday, seven militants of the Taliban were killed in another AAF strike against a Taliban's base in Hazhda Bala village in Sayaad district, in Sari Pul province, Rezai further said, adding that four Taliban members were also wounded in the airstrike.
Four killed in attack on university bus in Parwan
On Saturday afternoon, at least four people lost their lives after a bomb blast hit a passenger bus, carrying lecturers from Alberoni University in Bagram district of Parwan, Afghanistan’s TOLO news agency reported, citing a health official.
According to Dr. Qasim Sangin, chief medical officer at Parwan Hospital, 13 more people were wounded in the explosion.
Most of those affected in the attack were lecturers from Alberoni University in Parwan province, the report said.
The deadly blast took place in Rabat area in Bagram district at around 3:15 p.m. local time, Bagram police said in a statement.
No group has yet claimed responsibility for the blast.
The United States and its allies overthrew the Taliban regime shortly after the 2001 invasion of Afghanistan. But US forces remained bogged down there through the presidencies of George W. Bush, Barack Obama, Donald Trump, and now Joe Biden.
All foreign troops were supposed to have been withdrawn by May 1, as part of an agreement that the US had reached with the Taliban in the Qatari capital, Doha, last year. But US President Joe Biden last month pushed that date back to September 11.
The Taliban warned that the passing of the May 1 deadline for a complete withdrawal “opened the way for” the militants to take every counteraction they deemed appropriate against foreign forces in the county.