(14 Aug 2018) Afghan security forces pushed back the Taliban from the eastern provincial capital of Ghazni on Tuesday and were trying to flush the insurgents out of the city's outskirts.
The operations came on the fifth day after a massive Taliban attack on Ghazni.
Hundreds of people have fled the fighting in the city, which has so far killed about 100 members of the Afghan security forces and at least 20 civilians.
Nasart Rahimi, a deputy spokesman at the Interior Ministry, said security forces were searching every inch of Ghazni on Tuesday for remaining Taliban fighters.
Military helicopters were supporting the ground forces' operations in Ghazni, said Abdul Karim Arghandiwal, an army media officer in southeastern Afghanistan.
Taliban spokesman Zabihullah Mujahid denied the insurgents have been routed from Ghazni and said sporadic gun battles were still ongoing.
The Taliban's multipronged assault on the strategic city, about 120 kilometers (75 miles) from the capital of Kabul, began Friday.
The insurgents overwhelmed the city's defenses, pushed deep into Ghazni and captured several parts of it in a major show of force.
The United States has carried out airstrikes and sent military advisers to aid Afghan forces in the city of 270,000 people.
The fall of Ghazni, which is the capital of the province of the same name, would be an important victory for the Taliban, cutting Highway One, a key route linking Kabul to the southern provinces, the insurgents' traditional heartland.
The Taliban also destroyed a telecommunications tower on Ghazni's outskirts, cutting off landline and cellphone links to the city.
The fighting brought civilian life in the city to a standstill, and also severely damaged Ghazni's historic neighborhoods and cultural treasures.
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