The UN offices were attacked on Friday (July 30th) with a rocket launcher in Herat, the large city in western Afghanistan, around which the Taliban and Afghan forces clash, in an attack that claimed the lives of a policeman.

The insurgents, masters of large rural portions of Afghan territory, have also increased in recent days their pressure on two other provincial capitals in southern Afghanistan: Kandahar, the country's second city, and Lashkar Gah.

The attack "on the entrance to a clearly identified United Nations building" in Herat "was carried out by anti-government elements," Unama said in a statement, adding that an Afghan policeman guarding the building had been carried out. killed and several injured.

The entrance to the complex came under fire from rockets and guns, Unama continued, adding that no UN workers were injured.

The United Nations in #Afghanistan condemns the attack today on its compound in #Herat that killed an Afghan police guard & injured other officers.

Full statement here: https://t.co/OT5rVkiaZI pic.twitter.com/vEXHXjAlB6

- UNAMA News (@UNAMAnews) July 30, 2021

Fighting between government forces and the Taliban

The area where the targeted offices are located on the outskirts of Herat was the scene of intense fighting between government forces and the Taliban on Friday, which is closing in on this city, the provincial capital of 600,000 inhabitants and the third largest metropolitan area in the region. Afghanistan in terms of population.

"This attack on the United Nations is deplorable and we condemn it in the strongest terms," ​​said Deborah Lyons, the special representative of the UN secretary general in Afghanistan and head of Unama.

"Those who carried out this attack must be identified and held to account," she stressed.

Attacks against civilian personnel and UN buildings are prohibited by international law and can amount to war crimes, recalled Unama, who also paid tribute to the Afghan guards who defended the UN complex.

The United States has also "strongly condemned" the attack, through White House National Security Advisor Jake Sullivan.

"The UN in Afghanistan is a civilian entity focused on peace efforts, the rights of all Afghans and humanitarian and development assistance," Jake Sullivan noted in a statement, before calling on both sides to resume. their peace negotiations

The insurgents recently seized several districts of the province of Herat, as well as two border posts located there, that of Islam Qala, the main crossing point with Iran, and that of Torghundi with Turkmenistan. .

Many residents around Herat fled the fighting on Friday.

According to an AFP correspondent, Afghan forces and the Taliban clash in particular on Friday on the road leading to the airport, located about fifteen kilometers south of the center of Herat.

Locals also reported fighting in the districts of Guzara, where the airport is located, and Injil, which surrounds Herat.

"People are terrified," said Abdul Rab Ansari, who fled the district of Guzara to take refuge in the city.

According to Mohammad Allayar, another resident of the refugee area in Herat, "the fighting is intense" in the district of Guzara.

Escalation of violence in the south

The Taliban launched an all-out offensive against the Afghan forces at the beginning of May, thanks to the beginning of the final and now almost completed withdrawal of international troops from Afghanistan. In three months, they seized large, predominantly rural areas, facing government forces which have so far offered little resistance and now essentially only control the provincial capitals and most of the major roads. .

Unama also said on Friday "deeply concerned about the escalation of violence in and around Kandahar in the south, amid Taliban attacks on the city" and warned of "serious consequences for civilians that would have the continuation and the intensification of the engagements in the urban zones "of this agglomeration.

According to the UN mission, credible information reports dozens of civilians killed.

More than 230 have been injured since July 16, but the actual number is "certainly much higher," she adds.

Daud Farhad, the director of Kandahar's main hospital, said on Friday that 33 people, including 24 civilians, had been injured in the fighting in the past 24 hours.

For his part, Daud Shah, a policeman from Lashgar Gah, the capital of the southern province of Helmand, told AFP on Friday that the Taliban had launched "an operation from several directions" on this city the day before but that 'they had been pushed back, without it being possible to verify the reality of the situation on the ground.

With AFP

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