Amid an ongoing gun battle between Daesh insurgents and security forces on Wednesday, Save The Children organization issued a statement to say it had closed all its offices across Afghanistan for the time being. 

According to the statement, all projects had also been temporarily suspended.

“Save the Children can confirm that the security incident affecting our office in Jalalabad, Afghanistan is still ongoing. 

“Our primary concern remains to secure the safety of all of our staff.

“In response to this all of our programmes across Afghanistan have been temporarily suspended and our offices are closed,” read the statement. 

The organization went on to state that “Afghanistan is one of the most difficult places in the world to be a child and for humanitarian workers to operate in. 

“Our humanitarian work in Afghanistan reaches almost 1.4 million children.’

The agency went on to say “we remain committed to resuming our operations and lifesaving work as quickly as possible, as soon as we can be assured that it is safe to do so.”

This comes after a group of Daesh insurgents launched a coordinated attack on the aid agency’s office compound in Jalalabad at about 9am on Wednesday. 

By 5pm insurgents and security forces were still engaged in a heavy gun battle. Security officials said however that almost 50 people had been rescued from the building but that the whereabout of another 20 was not clear. Many are thought to have escaped. 

Daesh claimed responsibility for the incident earlier in the day.