Panjshir Valley
Amrullah Saleh urges UN to prevent 'Taliban's onslaught into Panjshir'
Afghanistan's caretaker president Amrullah Saleh has urged the United Nations to do everything in its power to prevent the Taliban from running over the resistance stronghold in Panjshir valley.
He highlighted a large-scale humanitarian crisis in Panjshir province and three Andrabs districts in Baghlan in a letter to the UN due to the economic blockade, telecommunication blackout by the Taliban, according to an NDTV report.
"We call on the United Nations and the international community to do its utmost to prevent the Taliban's onslaught into Panjshir province and encourage, negotiate a political solution to ensure thousands of displaced and hosting civilians are saved," Saleh said.
The Panjshir Valley is on the north of Kabul, the last Afghan province holding out against the militant group.
Saleh and son of Ahmad Shah Massoud, the military commander of the Northern Alliance, who fought the Taliban and U.S. forces till his assassination in 2001, another leader of the resistance, are presently in Panjshir valley and trying and offering a challenge to the Taliban.
The Taliban and other foreign groups have opened an all-out attack against Panjshir and other free areas of northern Afghanistan.
"Around 250,000 people including local women, children, elderly and 10,000 ten thousands of internally displaced persons (IDPs) who arrived in Panjshir after the fall Kabul and other large cities are also stuck inside these valleys and suffering from the consequences of this inhuman blockade."
Saleh said that "if no attention is paid to this situation, a full-scale human rights and humanitarian catastrophe including starvation and mass killing, even genocide of these people are in the making."
"The internally displaced persons and locals displaced by the Taliban onslaught are currently staying in mosques, schools, health centers, and in open spaces under the naked sky," he added.
"They urgently need food, shelter, water and sanitation, health care and non-food items. Office of the Acting President Amrullah Saleh appeals to the international community, the United Nations, the Red Cross and Red Crescent Movements, NGOs and other charity organizations to rapidly and generously respond to this overwhelming humanitarian crisis."
Saleh and Masoud had vowed to resist the Taliban in the country's northeastern province.
They continue with their offensive against the Taliban as their negotiations did not lead to any results.
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