Intense fighting between Taliban insurgents loyal to rival leaders has broke out in western Afghanistan Herat province, according to government officials.

The fighting left seven fighters dead and six others wounded initially, in Shindand district of Herat province. Prisoners were reportedly taken by both sides.

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Myanmar’s military has joined forces with an armed ethnic group that recently signed a “nationwide cease-fire agreement” with the government to launch an offensive against a holdout rebel army in the country’s Shan state, sources said Tuesday.

Captain Mai Aie Kyaw, a spokesman for the Ta’ang National Liberation Army (TNLA), told RFA’s Myanmar Service that his group had clashed with the Shan State Army-South (SSA-S) and government troops in recent days near Mong Wee village in northern Shan state’s Namhkam township.

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Two senior commanders of armed rebels were killed during the security activities of national security forces.

Interior ministry press office told BNA, Mawllawi Baz Mohammad shadow governor of Taliban for Sancharak district with Mawllawi Qameroddin military in charge of Taliban were killed during the security activities of police forces.

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The Shan State Army-North (SSA-N) has rejected an order from the Burma Army to withdraw from positions east of a motorway splicing Mong Nawng, Mong Hsu and Kyethi townships in central Shan State, with the group now bunkering down to defend itself against further attacks.

Government troops had given the Shan armed group five days to comply with the order or risk further fighting. The deadline passed on Sunday.

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Philippine marines killed eight suspected sympathisers of the Islamic State of Iraq and the Levant (ISIL) in a gun battle in the southern Philippines.

The men were killed in a brief firefight at dawn on Thursday near Palimbang town in Sultan Kudarat province, Brigadier General Emmanuel Salamat said. They were mostly Filipinos but one was possibly Indonesian.

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