KABUL: The Afghan Taliban announced Tuesday the start of their “spring offensive” even as the government in Kabul tries to bring the insurgents back to the negotiating table to end their drawn-out conflict.
The Taliban said in a statement they would “employ large-scale attacks on enemy positions across the country” during the offensive they have dubbed “Operation Omari” in honour of the movement’s late founder Mullah Omar, whose death was announced last year.
The annual spring offensive normally marks the start of the “fighting season”, though this winter the lull was shorter and they continued to battle government forces albeit with less intensity.
The statement promised “martyrdom-seeking and tactical attacks against enemy strongholds”, a reference to suicide bombings — a strategy the group has long resorted to against its enemies the Afghan police and army, whom they view as “stooges” of the West.
On Monday, 12 fresh recruits were killed in one such attack in the country’s east.
