General John Nicholson, commander of U.S and NATO forces in Afghanistan, has said that poor leadership is the number one cause of the current military fatality rate among the conventional forces in Afghanistan.
He also said that young Afghan officers battling insurgents in some remote regions continue to grapple with major issues such as food shortages and lack of ammunition.
In reference to the ongoing insurgency in Afghanistan, the top U.S commander stated that Daesh outfits have ramped up efforts to establish their so-called Khorasan Caliphate in Afghanistan by seeking support from an Uzbek military group known as Uzbekistan Islamic Movement and with the combination of some Pakistani militants loyal to the hardline militant group.
Nicholson noted that the Taliban and its brutal offshoot, the Haqqani network still operate in their safe havens inside the Pakistani territory and they have sanctuaries in that country.
The Taliban and Haqqani “still enjoy sanctuary in Pakistan,” Nicholson said, adding that they are still able to conduct operations from there.
The main-hub of Daesh militants is in the eastern Nangarhar province, and accounts for around 1,000 fighters. This province shares border with Pakistan.
Nicholson said the US has seen many foreign fighters joining Daesh in Afghanistan, particularly Uzbeks from the Islamic Movement of Uzbekistan (IMU) and Pashtuns from the Pakistani Taliban.
He said that the border region with Pakistan remains “very porous” and insurgents are able to move across in both directions. The fighters moving across are primarily Pakistani Taliban, Haqqani Network and Daesh-Khorasan.
Nicholson’s statement on poor leadership comes amid a dramatic surge in the level of violence in Afghanistan. Recently the Taliban launched a number of deadly offensives on some strategic locations in provinces in the south and in the north over the past few months.
The Ministry of Defense has pledged to address issues facing the security forces in lower levels.
“There are some tactical problems in the lower level, but the leadership of the ministry of defense is trying to address these issues through outlining the war policy,” said MOD spokesman Dawlat Waziri.
But, the Afghan government believes that Pakistan wields a strong reputation among militant groups including the Taliban and use them as tools to destabilize Afghanistan, something Islamabad insists is untrue.
The Afghan security and defense institutions also believe that the reason behind the surge in violence is that militants are coming in from Pakistan to fight in Afghanistan.
In a related development, Afghan Taliban is now in Pakistan to brief Islamabad on recent meetings With Kabul.
The delegation arrived in the country late last week from the Taliban’s so-called political office in Qatar, but Pakistani authorities have until now publicly declined to acknowledge its presence.
“We know that their [Taliban’s] delegation has come and its details have already been published in the newspapers. But, I think it would not be appropriate at this stage for me to disclose details of our discussions with them,” Sartaj Aziz, Pakistani prime minister’s adviser on foreign policy, told reporters.
The Taliban has already formally announced its high-powered delegation has undertaken the visit to discuss among other issues a Pakistani security crackdown on insurgent leaders, resulting in arrests of several of them and possible closure of religious seminaries for Afghan refugees in Baluchistan.
The southwestern Pakistani province shares a long border with Afghanistan where Taliban leaders and fighters are sheltering among hundreds of thousands of Afghan refugees.
The Taliban sent its delegation to Pakistan just days after reports emerged in the media of secret meetings in Qatar between Taliban negotiators and Afghan intelligence chief Muhammad Masoom Stanekzai. The group denied the reports as propaganda while Afghan officials have also publicly declined to acknowledge it.
But Aziz confirmed the meeting without sharing any details.
“There was a meeting in Qatar few days ago, and obviously they [the Taliban] are going to do some briefing about it [in their meetings]. And as we move forward, we will continue with our effort to see [the Afghan peace] dialogue and some reconciliation taking place for bringing lasting peace [in Afghanistan],” Aziz said.
He asserted that Pakistan, as part of a four-nation grouping, is continuing with its individual efforts to persuade the Taliban to come to the table for negotiations with the Afghan government.
The so-called Quadrilateral Coordination Group, or QCG, includes Afghanistan, the United States and China. It has held several meetings since the beginning of the year to try to arrange talks between the Afghan warring sides but has failed to make any progress other than just finalizing a so-called “road map” for peace.
Aziz reiterated that all the members have an obligation to make individual efforts toward promoting the Afghan reconciliation for bringing an end to the war in Afghanistan.
The crackdown on Taliban members in Baluchistan is targeting those insurgents who refuse to engage in peace talks with the Afghan government, senior Pakistani officials told VOA.
They insisted the insurgents are being pressured to either engage in peace talks or leave Pakistan. The presence of Taliban leaders on Pakistani soil has been at the center of Islamabad’s tensions with Kabul.
Afghan President Ashraf Ghani alleges the sanctuary in Pakistan has enabled the Taliban to prolong the war in his country and expand its influence after U.S.-led foreign combat troops withdrew from Afghanistan in 2014.