{"id":34950,"date":"2021-08-08T23:51:43","date_gmt":"2021-08-08T14:51:43","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.theguardian.com\/world\/2021\/aug\/08\/taliban-seize-symbolic-victory-with-capture-of-kunduz"},"modified":"2021-08-09T06:49:43","modified_gmt":"2021-08-08T21:49:43","slug":"taliban-seize-symbolic-victory-with-capture-of-kunduz","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/eastasianews.net\/wp\/?p=34950","title":{"rendered":"Major coup for Taliban as fighters take Afghan city of Kunduz"},"content":{"rendered":"<p>Insurgent group seizes important political and military hub as pro-government forces retreat<\/p>\n<p>The Taliban have claimed a huge symbolic victory after their fighters seized a large city for the first time in northern <a href=\"https:\/\/www.theguardian.com\/world\/afghanistan\">Afghanistan<\/a> as part of a seemingly unstoppable offensive in which they have captured five provincial capitals in just three days.<\/p>\n<p>Armed men swept into Kunduz on Sunday, a strategic city close to the border with Tajikistan and an important political and military hub. By mid-morning they controlled the city centre while pro-government forces retreated to the nearby airport. Residents <a href=\"https:\/\/twitter.com\/AhMukhtar\/status\/1424299224552910853\">fled as smoke from the city\u2019s burning market engulfed the sky<\/a>.<\/p>\n<p> <a href=\"https:\/\/www.theguardian.com\/world\/2021\/aug\/08\/taliban-seize-symbolic-victory-with-capture-of-kunduz\">Continue reading&#8230;<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>Insurgent group seizes important political and military hub as pro-government forces retreatThe Taliban have claimed a huge symbolic victory after their fighters seized a large city for the first time in northern Afghanistan as part of a seemingly unst&#8230;<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2371,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"sns_share_botton_hide":"","vkExUnit_sns_title":"","_vk_print_noindex":"","sitemap_hide":"","_veu_custom_css":"","veu_display_promotion_alert":"","vkexunit_cta_each_option":"","footnotes":""},"categories":[46,212,44,42],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-34950","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-afghanistan","category-middle-east-and-north-africa","category-taliban","category-world-news"],"veu_head_title_object":{"title":"","add_site_title":""},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/eastasianews.net\/wp\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/34950","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/eastasianews.net\/wp\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/eastasianews.net\/wp\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/eastasianews.net\/wp\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/2371"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/eastasianews.net\/wp\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=34950"}],"version-history":[{"count":3,"href":"https:\/\/eastasianews.net\/wp\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/34950\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":34968,"href":"https:\/\/eastasianews.net\/wp\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/34950\/revisions\/34968"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/eastasianews.net\/wp\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=34950"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/eastasianews.net\/wp\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=34950"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/eastasianews.net\/wp\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=34950"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}