OEF Update, Feb. 24, 2010: Operations in Afghanistan

Dispatches from the Front:

KABUL, Afghanistan, Feb. 24, 2010 -- An Afghan-international security force searched a vehicle yesterday just outside Marjah in Helmand's Nad Ali District after intelligence information indicated militant activity.

A search of the vehicle indicated a Taliban commander was possibly in a nearby village, which the joint force searched with the assistance of local elders. During the operation the security force detained several men for further questioning.

In other operations, an ANSF-ISAF patrol discovered a weapons cache consisting of 22 mortar rounds of various sizes in Manduzai District, Khost province yesterday. The ordnance was destroyed on site.

In the Reg-e-Khan District of Helmand province yesterday, an Afghan-ISAF patrol discovered 15 bags of marijuana totalling 100 kilograms. The drugs were destroyed.

A separate Afghan-ISAF patrol discovered a weapons cache while searching an insurgent bunker in Nad Ali District, Helmand province yesterday as part of Operation Moshtarak.

The cache consisted of three 107mm rockets, five rocket-propelled grenades, two anti-personnel charges, an artillery fuse and a hand grenade. The ordnance was destroyed.

Yesterday, Afghan national police defused four mines and discovered 50 kg of explosive materials in Helmand, Kandahar, Uruzgan and Kunduz provinces.

In an operation conducted by the ANP in Injeel District of Herat province yesterday, they discovered a machine gun, three mines, three hand grenades, five rocket rounds and 1,150 rounds of ammunition for a Kalashnikov rifle.

In the Zharay District of Kandahar province yesterday, an ANSF-ISAF patrol discovered an IED cache. The cache contained 40 kg of ammonium nitrate, eight 155mm shell casings, two radios, a dismantled radio, a circuit board and a large spool of wire. The materials were destroyed on site.

No Afghan civilians were harmed in these operations.

(From an International Security Assistance Force Joint Command news release.)