KABUL: Police found the bodies of 20 Taliban militants who froze to death after being driven by troops into the mountains of northern Afghanistan, police said Friday.

The bodies were found in two caves deep in snow-covered mountains in Baghlan province on Tuesday, said regional police spokesman Lal Mohammad Ahmadzai.

“The militants fled into the mountains a day before Afghan and NATO military forces were due to start an operation in central Baghlan,” he told AFP.

The deputy Taliban “shadow governor” of Baghlan was among the dead, he said.

Police who found the bodies in the caves in the Bysakal area near where three provinces — Baghlan, Kunduz and Takhar — converge also recovered weapons and explosives, Ahmadzai said.