Taliban fighters have claimed victory at the end of 13 years of NATO's combat mission in Afghanistan, ISAF, and the partial withdrawal of foreign troops.
"We have not been defeated. We have not signed any agreement with the United States to conclude the war, then where is the sense that America put an end to the war? This means that the US and its allies have been completely defeated and are fleeing from the battlefield," Taliban spokesman Zabiul Mujahid said.
The ISAF mission, which began after the invasion that ended the Taliban regime in 2001, comes to a close after the death of 3485 soldiers, 2356 of them from the US.
Mujahid said that deaths in the Taliban's ranks stand at 20,000.
A ceremony in Kabul on Sunday marked the completion of the gradual withdrawal of international troops and transfers of security from the 350,000 troops to the Afghan army and police which started in 2011.
The official end of the ISAF combat mission will be on December 31 at midnight, but NATO will continue its presence in the country with the Resolute Support mission, which will begin on January 1, 2015.
Mujahid said changing the name of the mission was camouflaging NATO's defeat.
In a statement on Monday, the Taliban said that the withdrawal of ISAF showed that perhaps the countries that invaded the country finally realised that the mission in Afghanistan was "the most idiotic decision of modern history".
Share
