KABUL, June 2 (Xinhua) -- Fifty-seven militants have been killed in a series of military operations in Afghanistan within 24 hours, the country's Interior Ministry said on Sunday.
"The Afghan National Police (ANP) supported by army and the NATO-led coalition forces carried out several joint operations in Kandahar, Ghazni, Helmand, Kapisa, Paktika and Paktiya provinces over the past 24 hours, killing 57 armed Taliban insurgents, wounding eight Taliban and detaining 12 other Taliban," the ministry said in a statement providing daily operational updates to the media.
The ANP also seized weapons besides defusing several roadside bombs and anti-vehicle mines, the statement said, without saying if there were any casualties on the side of security forces.
The Taliban insurgent group, which has been waging an insurgency of more than one decade, has yet to make comments.
The Afghan security forces and the NATO-led coalition troops have intensified operations against Taliban and other militant groups recently. But the insurgent groups responded by bombings.
On Saturday, eight civilians and three ANP cops were wounded when a bomb attached to a motorcycle went off in Qara Bagh district in the country's eastern province of Ghazni.
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