Twelve provincial Afghanistan capitals are now under Taliban control after the militant group captured strategic cities on Thursday, leaving the Afghan capital of Kabul increasingly beleaguered and cut off from the rest of the country.
The city of Herat, Afghanistan's third-largest city and a major urban center in western Afghanistan, fell to the Taliban on Thursday evening local time, with the group taking control of the governor's office and Herat police headquarters, according to Afghan officials.
Qala-I-Naw city, the provincial capital of the northwest Badghis province also fell to the militant group on Thursday evening, a Badghis provincial council member confirmed to CNN on Thursday. Afghan forces in the area have fled to the local army base, the only nearby location that has not fallen to the Taliban yet, the council member told CNN.
Earlier in the day, the city of Ghazni, a key provincial capital on the road to Kabul, also fell to the militant group after "long and intense fighting," according to Nasir Ahmad Faqiri, head of Ghazni provincial council.
A Taliban spokesman tweeted Thursday that the city had been seized, including the governor's office, police headquarters and prison.
Afghan security forces arrested Dawood Laghmani, the governor of Ghazni province, hours after the Taliban took the city, a spokesman for the Afghan interior ministry told journalists.
Laghmani was detained, along with his deputy and chief of staff, in Maidan Wardak, the province that lies between Kabul and Ghazni, the spokesman added.
The governor had surrendered to the Taliban, Faqiri, the provincial council head, confirmed to CNN.
Ghazni lies around 150 kilometers south of Kabul, on a major highway connecting the capital with Kandahar, Afghanistan's second largest city.
More than a third of the country's 34 provinces have now fallen to the Taliban.
Kandahar, which lies in the south of the country, has been besieged by the Taliban for weeks, and the group's spokesperson claimed on Wednesday that they had taken control of its prison. The Taliban claimed they had freed 1,000 inmates and distributed a video apparently showing them walking outside the jail.
Gul Ahmad Kamin, a Kandahari member of parliament, told CNN Taliban fighters have been able to break through the frontline into Kandahar and were engaging in sporadic confrontation with government forces inside the city.
Kamin also confirmed that a wedding hall in Kandahar which was the frontline position for Afghan forces is now under the Taliban control. The wedding hall, visited by CNN just days ago, is about 600 meters away from the prison.
Taliban fighters are shown patrolling the city of Ghazni on Thursday.
With the capture of Ghazni, the Taliban is now in control of key locations both to the north and south of Kabul. Their earlier capture of areas of the Baghlan province, which lies to the north of Kabul, raised alarms among US officials because the location is considered essential for the defense of the capital, according to a Biden administration official.
