Taliban claim to capture Kandahar, Afghanistan's second-largest city with over 600 thousand population. Central Afghan Government so far lost 12 cities to the Taliban.
The Taliban, officially known as the Islamic Movement of Taliban, also referring to themselves by their state name, the Islamic Emirate of Afghanistan, is an Afghan political and militant organization with an ideology comprising elements of the Deobandi movement of Islamic fundamentalism and Pashtun nationalism. It ruled approximately 90 per cent of Afghanistan from 1996 to 2001, before it was overthrown by an American-led invasion after the September 11 attacks carried out by the Taliban's ally al-Qaeda.
