KANDAHAR: The Taliban captured the strategic district of Sangin in the southern province of Helmand on Thursday, the culmination of years long offensive that took the lives of more combatants than any other fight for territory in Afghanistan, according to local officials.
While spokesmen for the central government denied claims by the Taliban that the district had fallen to them, some conceded that the insurgents had overrun the district center and government facilities. But local Afghan government and military officials said there was no doubt Sangin had finally fallen to their enemy.
More British and later American Marines died in Sangin than in any of Afghanistan’s roughly 400 other districts, until the international military coalition finally turned it over to Afghan military forces in 2013.
Since then, hundreds of Afghan soldiers and police officers have lost their lives defending Sangin, while American Special Operations soldiers and aerial bombing tried to prevent the collapse of the district, apparently without success.—APP
