Afghanistan Times
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AT Monitoring Desk-KABUL: The NATO Secretary General Jens Stoltenberg said that the presence of militants loyal to the Islamic State of Iraq and the Levant (ISIL) is underlining the importance of the NATO in Afghanistan.
“NATO contributes to the fight against ISIL and terrorism in many different ways. All NATO allies participate in the coalition and it is of great importance for the coalition that NATO allies, two decades of joint operations and exercising and exercises, have been able to develop interoperability, the ability to work together in this kind of military operations. So in that sense the coalition takes great advantage of interoperability that has been developed through NATO over the decades. Secondly, we provide direct support by the training of Iraqi officers,” Stoltenberg said.
Moreover, he said, “our presence in Afghanistan, NATO’s biggest military operation ever is, of course, part of our efforts to fight international terrorism and we also see an ISIL present in Afghanistan which is just underlining the importance of our presence there.”
It is worth mentioning that Islamic State (IS) which is also known as Daesh militants, are making all efforts to further gain hold in Afghanistan. Daesh militants are showing no mercy as recently they massacred more than 30 civilians. On Tuesday, Daesh fighters killed 38 civilian in the western Ghor province. This is the first time that Ghor province has been targeted by Daesh insurgents in large numbers as the group is mainly active in the eastern parts of the country.
However, it also indicates that Daesh militants are trying to establish basis in different provinces, especially after the Afghan security forces targeted their hideouts in eastern Nangarhar province.Several safe havens of the group were destroyed in the province in different operations.
Afghan security forces recently carried out a comprehensive operation aimed at suppressing Daesh militants in Nangarhar province, in which dozens of Daesh militants were killed and wounded.
