The militants of the Taliban radical movement are active on 70 percent of the Afghan territory, fully controlling 4 percent of the nation and demonstrating presence in another 66 percent, a BBC study has found.About 15 million of the Afghan citizens live in the areas either controlled by the radical movement or in the districts that are often targeted by Taliban's attacks, according to the broadcaster's research.The BBC investigation has revealed that the number of districts with Taliban's presence has increased since the mission carried out by the United States and its allies in Afghanistan ended in 2014 and the foreign troops were formally withdrawn from the country.The study has also found out that the Daesh terrorist group has presence in 30 of 399 Afghanistan's districts, mostly in northern and eastern parts of the nation, however, it has no full control of any district.Over the years, Afghanistan has been facing an unstable political and humanitarian situation, which had worsened due to the activities of terrorist groups such as Taliban and Daesh.In August 2017, Trump issued a new strategy concerning Afghanistan, which presupposed increase in US military presence in the country in order to force the Taliban group to negotiate a political settlement. The US military on Tuesday said that it was a “mistake” to put a media gag order on a federal auditor’s report that said 44% of Afghanistan was in control of or contested by militants. According to the most recent figures, published Oct. 30, just 231 of those districts (56.8 percent) were controlled or influenced by the Afghan government.
A BBC study finds that, as of October 2017[update], the Taliban presently maintains control of or has some territorial presence in 70% of Afghanistan, with full control of 14 districts (totaling 4% of the country) and demonstrating an open physical militant presence in 263 others (encompassing the remaining 66% of the group's occupied territory).