Fighting in Badakhshan enters fourth day as Tajikistan protests border spillover

Fighting between Taliban forces and Juma Khan Fateh, a former Taliban official and their commander, entered a fourth consecutive day in Badakhshan’s Nusay district, local sources told Amu on Friday, as neighboring Tajikistan protested what it said was a deadly spillover of the clashes across its border.

Local sources said the fighting continued intermittently in Nusay. Fateh, a former Taliban deputy governor of Zabul, has said he remains loyal to the Taliban but is in conflict with Taliban intelligence forces in the district, whom he accused of searching residents’ homes.

In a message addressed to Fasihuddin Fitrat, the Taliban army chief of staff, Fateh said his dispute was with the intelligence unit operating in the area rather than with the Taliban government itself.

“We have no problem with the Emirate,” Fateh said. “Even if they hang me, I was, am and will remain with this Emirate.”

The Taliban have not issued an official statement about the broader fighting.

The clashes have also produced conflicting accounts over damage to a Taliban military helicopter.

Local sources told Amu that Fateh’s forces brought down a Taliban helicopter carrying ammunition on Wednesday. The Taliban Defense Ministry disputed that account, saying the helicopter was damaged while landing after one of its blades struck an electricity pole.

No one was injured in the incident, the ministry said.

Tajikistan protests after woman killed

The fighting has also raised tensions across the border with Tajikistan.

Tajikistan’s Foreign Ministry said it sent a protest note to the Taliban after a 21-year-old woman was killed by gunfire originating from Afghanistan in the border region of Darvoz.

The ministry said the recent fighting in Afghanistan’s Badakhshan Province had also resulted in violations of Tajik airspace and damage to residential homes on its territory.

The claims mark a significant escalation in the consequences of the fighting, which had initially been confined to Nusay, a mountainous district along Afghanistan’s border with Tajikistan.

Taliban authorities have not publicly responded to Tajikistan’s remarks.

Local sources previously told Amu that the clashes had forced a large number of Nusay residents to leave their homes. The extent of the displacement and the number of casualties from the fighting remain unclear.

Fateh has emerged as a dissident Taliban commander in Badakhshan. Despite the confrontation, his latest comments appeared intended to distinguish his dispute with local Taliban intelligence forces from a broader rebellion against the Taliban leadership.