The Taliban on Thursday morning captured Ghazni city, the capital of Ghazni province, without any resistance from the security forces.
The head of the Ghazni provincial council in a Facebook post said that the governor of Ghazni handed over the city to the Taliban following his discussion with a Taliban commander Abu Bakr and then left the city toward Kabul with the escort of the Taliban.
Meanwhile, the Ministry of Interior said that governor of Ghazni province and his colleagues were arrested by security forces this afternoon.
The security forces are now deployed at an army base and fighting is ongoing between the security forces and the Taliban.
“They had an arrangement with him (governor), he might have thought there would be no accountability about how much money he had stolen that we sent to the security forces or how much he got from the Taliban,” said Amanullah Kamrani, the deputy head of Ghazni provincial council.
“Currently most areas in Ghazni city are under Taliban control,” said Naseer Ahmad Faqiri, the head of Ghazni's provincial council.
Meanwhile, there are reports that the Taliban have started house-to-house searches in Pul-e-Khumri, the center of Baghlan province.
Sources have said that Kunduz governor Ehsanullah Omarzad and Zabardast Safi, the police chief of Kunduz, are in Taliban custody.
“Everything in Kunduz has been looted, all government assets are in bad condition in Kunduz,” said Amruddin Wali, the head of the Kunduz provincial council.
“The government has done nothing so far,” said Naseer Sadiq, a journalist in the north.
“The scale of the tragedy in Badakhshan is very large, there are no exact figures are available so far,” said Zabihullah Atiq, MP.
Meanwhile, footage shared on social media shows the Taliban dragging a person in Farah city, throwing him into a hole, and then killing him.
The Taliban have taken over ten cities.