The March 1989 battle for Jalalabad, was to be beginning of the collapse of the Afghan Communist government forces, with those forces began negotiation of surrender to the native Afghan mujahideen. Unfortunately, radical non-Afghan salafists became involved, executing some 60 surrendering Communists, cutting their corpses into small pieces, and sending the remains back to the besieged city in a truck with the message that this would be the fate awaiting the infidels. Despite apologies and assurances of safety from Afghan resistance leaders, the Communists ended their negotiations of surrender, spurred them on to break the siege of Jalalabad and to win the first major government victory in years. "This success reversed the government's demoralization from the withdrawal of Soviet forces, renewed its determination to fight on, and allowed it to survive three more years."