World Bulletin / News Desk

At least five Afghan women were killed and a child was wounded in a landmine explosion Saturday morning in Afghanistan’s northern Faryab province, Afghan authorities said.

Local District Governor Abdul Razaq Kakar told The Anadolu Agency that the women had stepped out of the house in search of their husbands, who were members of local Afghan police, after they heard rumors that a check post in Gurziwan district’s Ghalbian village was overrun by the Taliban.

“However, the check post responsible to protect Ghalbian village had not been taken over, but in fact, it was handed over to the Taliban by the policemen along with their weapons overnight, which paved the way for control of militants in the area,” Kakar said.

The post was manned by two local police commanders along with their 13 personnel, who allegedly joined the Taliban.

Once the Taliban took control of the post, they planted landmines around it. “They wanted to kill our Afghan security forces by planting the landmines, but instead the family members of the turncoat policemen died,” he said.

The victims’ bodies still remain on the scene because rescuers were scared that there might be more landmines planted in the area. “It is a remote village; we are trying to get assistance from the provincial capital,” the official added.

Faryab, one of the safest provinces of Afghanistan until two years back, has now turned into a hotbed of Taliban and insurgency in the region. Local officials claim that tens of Uzbek, Tajik and Chechen militants along with their family members have moved to the province after the Pakistani army began a military operation in Pakistan’s Waziristan near the Afghan border.

In a separate incident, a senior local official said that three family members of a commander of the Islamic Movement of Uzbekistan militant group were exchanged with three kidnapped staff of an international humanitarian organization Friday in Faryab province.

“Afghan security forces had arrested three Uzbek women along with a child who were going to join their families about four weeks ago. The militants in turn kidnapped four staff of a nongovernmental organization, Coordination of Humanitarian Assistance, and later demanded an exchange with the women,” an Afghan police official told AA on condition of anonymity.

The militants killed a staff of the organization when the Afghan government initially refused to accept their demand.  “The exchange took place in Qaisar district yesterday afternoon,” the police official added.