Taliban attack kills 7 Afghan policemen in western city

In the western Afghan city of Farah, Taliban gunmen mounted an attack on a police post, killing seven police officers, said provincial police spokesman Mohibullah Mohib.

"Eight Taliban fighters were also killed in the clash that lasted for half an hour," he said, adding four policemen survived the attack.

The Taliban have not commented so far.

Thursday's attacks are the first such assaults Afghan officials have blamed on the Taliban since the end of the surprise ceasefire offered by the militants over the Eid al-Fitr festival.

However, Afghan security forces carried out airstrikes in the south on Wednesday that police said had killed 18 "militants."

According to Afghanistan's Independent Human Rights Commission, civilian casualties fell by 80 percent during the short truce.

A key provision of the February 29 agreement between the Taliban and the United States, to which the Afghan government was not a party, involved a U.S. commitment to reduce its military footprint in Afghanistan from about 13,000 to 8,600 by mid-July and, conditions permitting, to zero by May 2021.