Deadly Taliban offensive gains ground in east Afghanistan

Hundreds of Taliban fighters have stormed a strategic district in an Afghan province southwest of the capital and are on the verge of capturing it after killing dozens of people and beheading some in days of fighting, officials said Friday.

The Ghazni provincial government has lost contact with police in the province's western district of Ajrestan, said Asadullah Safi, deputy police chief of the area. An army unit reported that fighting was raging late on Friday afternoon, another provincial official said.

"If there is no urgent help from the central government, the district will collapse," Safi said earlier.

The battle for Ajrestan illustrates the grave challenges facing Afghanistan's new president and the security forces in holding territory as foreign combat troops prepare to withdraw at the end of the year.

No longer pinned down by U.S. air cover, Taliban fighters are attacking Afghan military posts in large numbers with the aim of taking and holding ground.

Ghazni is on the main highway linking Kabul to southern Afghanistan, where the Taliban have been making advances in recent months.

The attack by an estimated 700 Taliban fighters began about five days ago and early reports were that more than 100 people had been killed, including 15 who were beheaded by the fighters, said provincial deputy governor Ahmadullah Ahmadi.

Fearing that the Taliban would gain even more ground, Ahmadi told Al Jazeera he was calling for increased support from the central government. However, the province is in a remote region and difficult to reach.

Many of the civilians killed were either family members of local police or lived in villages where local police have battled the Taliban before, Ahmadi said.

The Taliban told Al Jazeera on Friday that they were intent on taking Ajrestan and had sent hundreds of fighters to the area to achieve that goal. The group also claimed it had killed 40 policemen.

Safi said a suicide car bomber attacked a police checkpoint early on Friday before provincial authorities lost contact with the district.

By late Friday afternoon, officials had contacted an army unit that reported that fighting was still going on, Ahmadi said. 

The Taliban are fighting to expel U.S.-led foreign forces and the U.S.-backed Kabul government.

Control of Ghazni's mountainous Ajrestan district, about 125 miles from Kabul, could provide the Taliban with a launching point for attacks in two bordering provinces and along the crucial artery connecting the capital to Afghanistan's second city of Kandahar in the south.

The growing Taliban threat is likely to be the most urgent challenge for the new, U.S.-brokered government of national unity between President-elect Ashraf Ghani and his former rival Abdullah Abdullah.

Provincial authorities have appealed for help from the central government in Kabul, where Ghani is in the process of taking over the presidency from Hamid Karzai.

"We have asked repeatedly for helicopters to evacuate the wounded, but so far nothing has been done," Ahmadi said.

Months of deadlock over a disputed election and uncertainty over whether any U.S. troops will remain beyond this year has battered morale among Afghan security forces.

"Peace with the Taliban requires a strong government. At the moment, the Taliban think they can fight in every province and they believe they can overthrow the government," said Haji Mohammad Mohaqiq, Abdullah's running mate and the leader of Afghanistan's ethnic Hazara minority.

"Without international support it will be hard to provide security ... The example of Ajrestan district shows that without international commitment of troops, it will be difficult to handle the Taliban."

Al Jazeera and Reuters