More than 22,000 Afghan families have fled from their homes to escape fighting in the former Taliban bastion of Kandahar, officials said Sunday, as authorities arrested four suspected insurgents over this week’s rocket attack on Kabul.

Since early May, violence has surged across several provinces including in Kandahar after the insurgents launched a sweeping offensive just days after the US-led foreign forces began their final withdrawal.

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Two suspected communist rebels were killed and 12 high-powered firearms were recovered in an encounter with the government troops in Sagñay town in Camarines Sur province on Monday morning.

Captain John Paul Belleza, Philippine Army’s 9th Infantry Division public affairs chief, said the police and the Army’s 83rd Infantry Battalion had a 30-minute firefight with at least 20 members of the New People’s Army in Barangay Bongalon at around 10:45 a.m.

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A Taliban attack was repulsed at an Afghan town near the country’s border with Uzbekistan, a top police official said.

The attack took place on Sunday in Hairatan town, Balkh province.

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The Taliban now controls nearly 80 percent of Afghanistan, a spokesperson for the Taliban politburo told Rudaw on Friday.

“Before the recent events, we had around 70 percent of the land in our hands. Right now, around 80 percent of the area is under our control,” Mohammed Naeem told Rudaw’s Bestoon Khalid. “Previously we had many areas under our control, just not the centers of the districts, but now we are slowly controlling the centers as well.”

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Full-throated they belt out songs of victory, their boots adding the drumbeat as ranks of new recruits jog in formation through their jungle training camp.

There’s no doubting the shining eyes of these young people united by an ideal — freedom from the junta that’s smothered democracy in Myanmar.

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