20 Taliban drown as Afghan forces sink fleeing boat

AP/Washington Post:

Afghan forces sank a boat carrying suspected Taliban fighters fleeing an attack, and more than 20 drowned, officials said Tuesday, as a separate gunbattle and airstrikes killed an estimated two dozen militants in southern Afghanistan.

The Taliban fighters attacked Afghan and U.S.-led coalition troops with rockets and gunfire Monday in the Shah Wali Kot district of Kandahar province, sparking a four-hour battle, a coalition statement said. Fighter aircraft bombed three enemy positions, it said.

The statement said "an estimated two dozen enemy fighters" were killed during the battle, but gave no further details on the casualty toll.

In neighboring Helmand province, between 20 and 30 suspected Taliban fleeing Afghan and foreign troops drowned in the Helmand River while trying to cross from Sangin to Musa Qala when their boat was shot at and sunk by security forces, said Gen. Mohammad Zahir Azimi, spokesman for the Ministry of Defense.

"The enemy shot from the boat toward the security forces and the security forces in response shot at the boat. As a result the boat sank," the Defense Ministry said in a statement.

On Friday, a makeshift boat carrying fighters fleeing a battle sank, killing an estimated 60 Taliban, Azimi said.

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The Taliban do not appear to be any better at riverine warfare than they are at ambushes. Swimming was described as an un-Islamic activity in this story in the London Daily Express.

DEMANDS for a ban on “un-Islamic” activities in schools will be set out by the Muslim Council of Britain today.

Targets include playground games, swimming lessons, school plays, parents’ evenings and even vaccinations. (Emphasis added)

And the calls for all children to be taught in Taliban-style conditions will be launched with the help of a senior Government education adviser.

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It is clear that marking swimming as un-Islamic has not been a good idea for the Taliban. You would think that it would cause them to question some of the other tenants of their weird religious beliefs. Buy, hay, if they chose not to learn to swim that should make another choice to avoid water that is over their head. This should be a lesson for the multi culties that some cultures are inferior to our own.