US stops releasing info on Taliban attacks

The U.S. mission in Afghanistan has for the first time refused to publicly release its data on insurgent attacks amid the implementation of a peace agreement between the United States and the Taliban, an American watchdog group said Friday.

The decision not to release the data comes as the Trump administration is eager for the U.S.-Taliban agreement to be seen as successful so that President Donald Trump can meet his commitments on pulling troops out of Afghanistan.

Washington’s Special Inspector General for Afghanistan Reconstruction, or SIGAR, which monitors billions of dollars in U.S. aid to Afghanistan, expressed its concern in its quarterly report, which also discusses the reduction in ground operations of Afghan forces.

However, Pentagon Spokesman Jonathan Hoffman says the military's leadership backs the change in reporting.

"The decision was that we're working toward a better solution, and a better place for Afghanistan, and that the sharing of that information would not be would not move that ball forward," Hoffman said.

"And so that decision was made. We're supportive of it," he said.

The office of Afghanistan's national security adviser earlier this week said the Taliban have carried out 2,804 attacks since the peace agreement between the Taliban and U.S. was signed on Feb. 29.

U.S. officials and the Afghan government have repeatedly urged the Taliban to reduce their attacks in the wake of the agreement, but the insurgent group has continued to target Afghan security outposts at “levels above the seasonal norms," according to the report.

In another development, the Pentagon says lessons learned from the outbreak aboard the USS Teddy Roosevelt helped with the military's response to the more recent outbreak aboard the USS Kidd.

"There are a number of things that we did where we considered it a success," Hoffman said.

"We consider that a good lesson, and a good effort by the Navy to learn from from events that have happened in less than a month, and to adopt those and apply those to the force," he said.

For most people, the coronavirus causes mild or moderate symptoms, such as fever and cough that clear up in two to three weeks. For some, especially older adults and people with existing health problems, it can cause more severe illness, including pneumonia and death. The vast majority of people recover.