The Taliban said on Sunday that hundreds of its militia were starting towards Panjshir Valley, one of the few parts of Afghanistan not yet controlled by the group.
“Hundreds of Mujahideen of the Islamic Emirate are heading towards the state of Panjshir to control it after local state officials refused to hand it over peacefully,” the Taliban wrote on its Arabic Twitter account.
In Panjshir, Ahmad Massoud, the son of legendary mujahideen commander Ahmad Shah Massoud who was assassinated by Al-Qaeda two days before the September 11, 2001 attacks, has sought to gather a force of around 9,000 people to counter the militants, the spokesman Ali Maisan Nazary, told AFP.
Pictures of training exercises released by AFP show dozens of recruits performing fitness routines, and a handful of armoured humvees driving across the valley, northeast of Kabul.
Nazary said that the group wants to push for a new system of government, but is ready to fight if needed. “Government forces came to Panjshir from several Afghan provinces,” Massoud told Saudi Arabia’s Al-Arabiya broadcaster on Sunday.
