Patters

The Taliban are actually gaining strength in parts of Afghanistan. Are we failing there, too? Is the Bush administration not doing enough?

http://www.alertnet.org/thenews/newsdesk/ISL157000.htm

KABUL, May 24 (Reuters) - The Taliban are gaining strength in parts of Afghanistan, the U.S. military said on Wednesday, after a week of the heaviest fighting in years was reported to have killed about 300 people.

Nearly five years after they were forced from power by U.S. and Afghan forces, the Taliban appear better organised and more aggressive than at any time since their ouster in 2001.

Most of those killed in a series of clashes since Wednesday last week were militants but dozens of Afghan police, soldiers and civilians have also been killed, along with four foreign soldiers.

In the latest fighting, U.S. and Afghan government forces killed 24 insurgents in a battle in Uruzgan province in the south on Tuesday. An Afghan policemen and four Afghan soldiers were also killed, the U.S. military said.

"There's no doubt that the Taliban have grown in strength and influence in certain areas in Kandahar, Helmand and in southern Uruzgan," U.S. military spokesman Colonel Tom Collins told a briefing, referring to three southern provinces.