US faces 'utter defeat': Taliban
2012-09-11 10:01
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2012-09-11 07:30
It has been called the day that changed the world. Eleven years after the September 11 attacks, the striking images and sounds of that day are burned into the collective consciousness.VIEW
Washington - US forces face "utter defeat" in Afghanistan and Americans are unsafe wherever they go in the world, the Taliban said ahead of the anniversary of the 11 September 2001 terror attacks.
Eleven years ago on Tuesday, almost 3 000 people lost their lives in the worst terror strike on American soil that saw two passenger aircraft hijacked by al-Qaeda slam into New York's World Trade Centre and another into the Pentagon. A fourth aircraft crashed in a Pennsylvania field.
What followed was a war in Afghanistan, launched over the Taliban's alliance with al-Qaeda.
"The anniversary of 9/11 is approaching America this year at a time when it is facing utter defeat in Afghanistan militarily, politically, economically and in all other facets and it has exhausted all other means through which to prolong its illegal war," said a statement from the Afghan Taliban, the US-based Site Intelligence Group said on Monday.
The statement, which the Taliban wrote in English and posted on Sunday, goes on to say that the war in Afghanistan "under the pretext of retaliation for the September incident has no legal or ethical" basis, and that Afghans had "no hand" in what happened.
Even though the United States has spent "large amounts of military and economical assets" in the war, "no American is safe in any society today", the statement said.
2 000 killed
The Taliban also claimed it was not a threat but vowed to defend its homeland and continue with its "sacred struggle" against "the invaders".
"The Islamic Emirate, on the eleventh anniversary of the September incident, once again calls upon the American officials, its coalition members and its people to halt shedding the blood of the oppressed Afghans under this pretext and to follow the path of sound reasoning instead of tyranny and stupidity."
The war in Afghanistan has steadily lost popular support in the United States.
A growing majority of Americans oppose the US military presence in Afghanistan and support Nato's plan to withdraw most combat forces by the end of 2014.
More than 2 000 US troops have been killed in Afghanistan. Around 77 000 are currently stationed in the country.
In a separate statement, also released on Sunday according to Site, the Taliban accused CIA Director David Petraeus of founding the "Arkabi" militia groups and alleged that he is therefore "directly involved" in killings attributed to them.
