August 2020. Afghan security forces have retaken a prison in eastern Afghanistan after an hours-long gun battle with the ISIL fighters who targeted the facility in an attack that killed 29 people, officials said. At least 10 ISIL fighters involved in the assault were also killed while trying to free their comrades from the prison in Jalalabad, the capital of Nangarhar province, said Ajmal Omar, a provincial council member. “The attack is now over,” Sohrab Qaderi, a member of the provincial council, told Reuters news agency. The rest of the dead were believed to be prisoners, civilians and Afghan forces, although no official breakdown was given. Another 50 people were wounded in the attack that began on Sunday when a suicide bomber detonated his explosives-packed vehicle at the entrance to the prison complex some 115 kilometres (70 miles) east of Kabul, Omar said. Other fighters simultaneously stormed the prison and took up positions in nearby residential buildings. They fired on Afghan troops for several hours, even after the security forces retook the prison and began recapturing some of the escaped inmates. Omar said about 430 prisoners stayed in their cells or hid during the siege. It was unclear how many prisoners remain at large.
Aug 2020. Attack on Prison at eastern Afghanistan
