The Shah-i-Kot Valley (also Shahi-Kot, Shah-e-Kot and other variant spellings) is a valley in
Afghanistan
Afghanistan, officially the Islamic Emirate of Afghanistan,; prs, امارت اسلامی افغانستان is a landlocked country located at the crossroads of Central Asia and South Asia. Referred to as the Heart of Asia, it is bord ...
's
Paktia
Paktia ( Pashto/ Dari: – ''Paktyā'') is one of the 34 provinces of Afghanistan, located in the east of the country. Forming part of the larger Loya Paktia region, Paktia Province is divided into 15 districts and has a population of rough ...
province, southeast of the town of
Zormat. The terrain in and around the valley is notoriously rugged, located at a
mean
There are several kinds of mean in mathematics, especially in statistics. Each mean serves to summarize a given group of data, often to better understand the overall value ( magnitude and sign) of a given data set.
For a data set, the '' ari ...
altitude
Altitude or height (also sometimes known as depth) is a distance measurement, usually in the vertical or "up" direction, between a reference datum and a point or object. The exact definition and reference datum varies according to the context ...
of . Shah-i-Kot means "Place of the King" and it has historically been a redoubt for Afghan
guerrillas hiding from foreign invaders.
History
The area was the scene of fierce fighting between the Afghan
mujahideen rebels and
Soviet forces during the
Soviet–Afghan War, as the
battle for Hill 3234
The battle for Hill 3234 (Russian: Бой у высоты 3234) was a successful defensive battle fought by the 345th Independent Guards Airborne Regiment, Soviet Airborne Troops, in Afghanistan against a force of some 250 Mujahideen rebels wh ...
.
In 2002 the valley was also the scene of
Operation Anaconda
Operation Anaconda was a military operation that took place in early March 2002 as part of the War in Afghanistan. CIA paramilitary officers, working with their allies, attempted to destroy al-Qaeda and Taliban forces. The operation took pl ...
, one of the largest battles of the
War in Afghanistan.
See also
*
Khost-Gardez Pass
References
Valleys of Afghanistan
Wars involving the Taliban
Landforms of Paktia Province
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