Haji Ghalib, the governor of the Achin district in the beleaguered province, said on Friday that 32 ISIS extremists had been slain in the district, located 150 kilometers (86 miles) east of the capital Kabul, the previous night during counter-terror operation.

Ghalib said a radio base used by ISIS elements in Afghanistan to be in touch with fellow militants in Iraq and neighboring Syria was also destroyed in the operation.

The development came a day after Colonel Hazrat Hussain Mashriqiwal, a spokesman for the Nangarhar provincial police department, said that 28 ISIS terrorists were killed when Afghan soldiers launched a series of operations in the Achin district.

He added that eight ISIS militants were also wounded in the offensives.

Nangarhar has been witnessing a rise in the number of ISIS terrorists in some of its districts in recent months.

On June 16, the Afghan Taliban militant group warned ISIS ringleader Ibrahim al-Samarrai aka Abu Bakr al-Baghdadi against “waging a parallel insurgency in Afghanistan.”

Afghanistan is gripped by insecurity 14 years after the United States and its allies attacked the country as part of Washington’s so-called war on terror. Although the 2001 attack overthrew the Taliban, many areas across Afghanistan still face violence and insecurity; Press TV reported.

S/SH