Video shows anti-Taliban forces in training
Video footage showed fighters belonging to leader of Afghanistan's last major outpost of anti-Taliban resistance, Ahmed Massoud, training in the Kotal-e Anjuman mountain pass, north east of Afghanistan on Tuesday (August 24).
The video, filmed by UAE-based Erem News, showed the fighters vowing to push back against the Taliban, who took over the country recently.
Massoud is the son of former anti-Soviet Mujahideen commander, Ahmed Shah Massoud.
The anti-Taliban leader said on Sunday (August 22) he hoped to hold peaceful talks with the Islamist movement that seized power in Kabul a week ago but that his forces were ready to fight.
An unnamed fighter said, "We hit the Taliban in Parwan, Kapisa and other northern places and they went to their supporters. This time we will stand against them with a force that will make their faces black and we will send them to their supporters."
The Taliban were in position near the Panjshir valley where Massoud is based, and had retaken three districts in northern Afghanistan that fell to local militia groups last week, a spokesman said on Monday (August 23), though there were no confirmed reports of further fighting.
