Hundreds of members of Afghanistan's security forces have been killed recently fighting insurgent attacks on the main city in the southern province of Helmand, officials said on Friday.
Abdul Majeed Akhonzada, deputy head of the provincial council, and lawmaker Sheer Muhammad Akhon put the number of soldiers and police killed in the past 10 days in and around Lashkar Gah at more than 200.
Separately, they each said 45 civilians had also been killed in the fighting, which saw Taliban militants launch attacks on at least two areas of the city earlier this week.
Akhon says 100 security forces personnel have also been wounded. Both police and soldiers fight on Afghanistan's front lines.
Akhonzada and Akhon both say it is the worst situation the province has faced in the 15 years since the Taliban's regime ended with the 2001 U.S. invasion.
Comment: The last line seems to say it all and may explain why U.S. forces did nothing to help - especially since control of poppy crops are so important to the black budget fund-raising of Empire. At the same time, the Taliban is traditionally against the production of the poppy and kept the crop in relatively low production prior to the US moving into Afghanistan. So, was this recent attack actually the Taliban, or some US-funded and supported group made to look like the Taliban? Or, were they the real thing and the US just lost some prized poppy-growing fields?
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