Officials said on Wednesday that at least 13 Afghan police officers were killed in an attack on their checkpoint in Afghanistan's northern Baghlan province.

In the overnight attack that took place in the Wazirabad area of Pol-e-Khumri district, another three policemen were injured, Provincial Councilors Firuzuddin Aimaq and Shamsulhaq Barakzai told the DPA news agency.

Aimaq said that during the battle, an armored tank and several police vehicles were torched.

The Taliban have been blamed by Afghan officials for carrying out the attack.

The armed group has not yet made any statements about the incident.

It was also said that Taliban fighters carried out attacks against government forces in the southern province of Uruzgan in the country.

The attacks took place in the Dehrawood district, Provincial Governor Speaker Ahmad Shah Sahel and Provincial Councillor Hayatullah Fazly said.

Afghan peace talks are expected to begin in early January.

For more than two months, the Afghan government and the Taliban have been conducting peace talks aimed at ending decades of war, but the violent fighting in the country continues.

The negotiations, initiated in Qatar in September following a historic U.S.-Taliban agreement reached in February, have been suspended and will resume on 5 January.

Afghan President Ashraf Ghani said on Monday that he hoped talks in Afghanistan would continue.

Both parties have made initial progress since the beginning of the negotiations, which was widely welcomed.

In exchange for security assurances and a Taliban promise to hold talks with the government, the US agreed to withdraw all troops from Afghanistan by May 2021.