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Afghanistan imposes night curfew to curb Taliban advance
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Afghanistan imposes night curfew to curb Taliban advance

Thirty-one of the country’s 34 provinces to be under 10pm to 4am curfew, interior ministry announces.

International

Afghanistan’s government has imposed a night-time curfew across almost all of the country’s 34 provinces to stem surging violence unleashed by a sweeping Taliban offensive that has seen the armed group make rapid territorial gains.

“To curb violence and limit the Taliban movements, a night curfew has been imposed in 31 provinces across the country,” except in Kabul, Panjshir and Nangarhar, the interior ministry said in a statement on Saturday.

The measure will be effective between 10pm and 4am local time, Ahmad Zia Zia, deputy interior ministry spokesman, said in a separate audio statement to reporters.

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Al Jazeera’s James Bays, reporting from the capital, Kabul, said the reason for the curfew was “quite straightforward”.

“It’s been clear for many years that in contested parts of Afghanistan, the government may control things during the day, but the Taliban, very much, own the night.”

‘The war has come to their doors’

Fahim Sadat, the head of the international relations department at Kardan University, told Al Jazeera that “the government wants to keep an eye or restrict the movement from one region to another”.