Pat Dollard | Young Americans

Agencie France Presse:

Afghanistan deployed more troops overnight to prepare for a “clean-up” operation against Taliban militants who have massed in villages near Kandahar, officials said Wednesday.

NATO spokesman Mark Laity said Afghan and Canadian troops have moved into the Arghandab region just outside of Kandahar city and said troops have already traded gunfire with militants.

Authorities also imposed a night-time curfew in the whole of Kandahar province, the region where the hardline Taliban regime rose to power and then made its last stand against US-led forces in late 2001.

The Taliban build-up comes days after more than 1,000 prisoners including hundreds of rebels escaped from Kandahar prison following a suicide attack, a major challenge to the authority of President Hamid Karzai.

“Thousands of soldiers have been dispatched to Kandahar overland and by air to get ready for the clean-up operation,” General Mohammad Zahir Azimi the Afghan defence ministry spokesman told AFP.

Some of the extra forces were deployed on Tuesday while hundreds more troops were sent overnight who are in the process of being deployed, Azimi said.

Azimi said he could not give the exact time the operation will begin as a matter of policy but said the Afghan forces were ready to “clean the area of Taliban.”

A police officer on the ground who did not want to be named also said sporadic clashes had already began between Taliban and Afghan forces.

Provincial police chief Sayed Aqa Saqib meanwhile said that authorities have “announced a curfew from 11:00 at night to 4:00 in the morning in Kandahar province”, adding that it was related to Taliban activities in the area.

Afghan officials say that around 400 Taliban rebels had blown up bridges and laid mines in Arghandab, while hundreds of residents have fled the area for safer places.