Rumsfeld says remaining military task in Afghanistan will be 'tough, dirty, hard work'

At a news conference at NATO headquarters in Brussels, Belgium, Rumsfeld said bin Laden and other al-Qaida and Taliban senior leaders remain on the loose, although more prisoners were taken Tuesday.

"We have reduced the number of areas within Afghanistan where they are likely to be," Rumsfeld said, and attacks continue.

"The task is still ahead of us and it should not be considered that it will be accomplished in a short period of time," he said. "It's going to be tough, dirty, hard work."

At the Pentagon, officials said three al-Qaida fighters have been taken into custody in Afghanistan, and more than a dozen more prisoners captured by Afghan allies were being handed over to American forces Tuesday.

Meanwhile, a second American soldier was injured while trying to clear land mines in Afghanistan.

In Brussels, Rumsfeld cautioned NATO defense ministers: "We need to face the reality that the attacks of Sept. 11 - horrific as they were - may in fact be a dim preview of what is to come if we do not prepare today to defend our people from adversaries with weapons of increasing power and range."

According to the written text of his remarks, Rumsfeld added: "It should be of particular concern to all of us that the list of countries which today support global terrorism overlaps significantly with the list of countries that have weaponized chemical and biological agents, and which are seeking nuclear, chemical and biological weapons - and the means to deliver them."

Approximately 15 new prisoners captured by northern opposition fighters were en route from a detention facility in northern Afghanistan to one the Marines just built at Kandahar airport, said Defense Department spokesman Richard McGraw.

He said he didn't know whether they were al-Qaida or Taliban but indicated they had already been interviewed by Americans and were found to be people of interest to the Pentagon.

Their arrival would bring to about 20 the number of battlefield detainees in U.S. custody out of thousands that have been captured by allies in Afghanistan and at least dozens taken by Pakistan.

U.S. soldiers and CIA agents for weeks have been interviewing fighters captured by opposition forces to see if they are wanted by America or might be useful for intelligence.

"If so, we say, 'We'd be happy to take these off your hands," McGraw said.

At about 1 a.m. EST Tuesday a U.S. Army soldier was injured at Bagram Airport near Kabul during a mine-clearing operation, the Pentagon said.

McGraw said the soldier, whose name was not released, lost his foot in the blast.

Another soldier, 21-year-old Cpl. Chris Chandler, was sweeping for mines over the weekend at Kandahar airport in the south of the country when one went off, taking his foot.

The three al-Qaida prisoners already in custody have joined American Taliban John Walker and Australian Taliban David Hicks on board the USS Peleliu in the Arabian Sea.

Pentagon officials hope they will provide answers to the big question: Where are Osama bin Laden and Taliban leader Mullah Mohammed Omar? Prisoners also might have information on planned terrorist attacks on the United States and its allies, as well as details on the network's finances and so on.

CIA and military personnel are known to be interviewing prisoners of anti-Taliban forces in Afghanistan, and U.S. officials are believed to have access to question Pakistan's prisoners, as well. Many of the prisoners were caught fleeing the U.S. strikes in Afghanistan.

"The search is now on cave to cave to find more and to interrogate more," Rear Adm. John Stufflebeem told a Pentagon press conference Monday. "Now becomes the more difficult and slower process of confirming who is still left to fight, or is this cave now empty and was there evidence that somebody was recently there."

Anti-Taliban tribal militiamen and U.S. special forces pursued remnants of al-Qaida in the caves of eastern Afghanistan.

Many were fleeing south and east into Pakistan, which has stationed troops along its border to catch them.

Pakistan had dozens of prisoners it had captured fleeing Afghanistan, officials said, but it couldn't turn them over to American troops because planned U.S. detention facilities were not ready, said one defense official.

Americans are building detention centers at the Kandahar airport and at Camp Rhino to the south. The one at Kandahar can hold 100 now, McGraw said. Another official said it need will likely be expanded.

"There'll be more detainees coming," said Stufflebeem.

AP-WS-12-18-01 1112EST [an error occurred while processing this directive]