Mullah Abdul Salam Abed, a senior Taliban commander, along with twenty five other Taliban militants have been killed in a fresh military operation in southern Afghanistan. The National Directorate of Security (NDS) has, in a statement, said that Abed is the brother of Abdul QayyomZaker, the second deputy of Mullah Omar, the Taliban leader. The Taliban have been waiting for foreign forces to leave Afghanistan.
Over the last few years, they have shown no signs of willingness to join the peace process launched by Afghan government and supported by the international community.
They instead used some impostors to get money allocated to the peace process and assassinate some of the most prominent leaders and figures in the country. Agha Jan Motasem, the former head of political committee of the Taliban, in a recent interview with BBC said that the Taliban have a unified leadership and will not be happy with less than an Islamic government.
The Taliban have repeatedly said that they are fighting a Jihad against occupying forces with the aim of re-establishing their Islamic Emirate. This goal is reflected in Motasem's interview as well as he says: the uprising of the Taliban is aimed at implementing Islamic Sharia law and thus for the Taliban it is important that a strong Islamic system be created, occupation of foreigners ends; for the Taliban, position and post is not important, the aim is just strong Islamic state.
To this end, they have been attempting to expand their influence and carrying out suicide attacks both in the capital and provinces of Afghanistan. That the Taliban have been offered a lot of opportunities to break links with Al-Qaeda and other terrorist networks, denounce violence and accept the constitution of Afghanistan to begin to live a peaceful life. But they have been rejecting these opportunities.
In fact, the Taliban continue to poison schoolchildren, close down schools, do mass destruction, mass disruption and killing almost on a daily basis. So it is time to put increased military pressure on the Taliban and other insurgent groups.
In fact, Afghan and foreign forces have got only two more years to crack down on the Taliban insurgents and other militants. It is time to go for it. Experiences from the last few years show that military pressure does work. In fact, the Taliban continue to seep into areas when there is not enough pressure or when they are called as unhappy brothers.