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Alliance: Battle rages near Kandahar
11/30/2001
By KATHY GANNON KABUL, Afghanistan — Anti-Taliban fighters battled the hard-line militia
Thursday on the outskirts of Kandahar, the ousted regime's last bastion, a key
commander said. The Taliban's supreme leader declared the decisive battle ``has
now begun.'' Witnesses described heavy bombing around Kandahar over the past two
days, and the Taliban reportedly hanged an Afghan man there Thursday after
accusing him of helping Americans call in airstrikes. The northern alliance's deputy defense minister, Bismillah Khan, told The
Associated Press anti-Taliban fighters reached the eastern edge of Kandahar —
the Taliban's birthplace and the only city still under their control — and
``there is heavy fighting going on.'' In Washington, Pentagon spokesman Rear Adm. John Stufflebeem said he could
not confirm or deny that anti-Taliban fighters had entered Kandahar. He
indicated northern alliance troops might be in the province of the same name,
which covers a large area of southern Afghanistan. ``I can accept that they have entered the province, but not in a large
movement,'' he told reporters. Speaking from the capital of Kabul in a series of calls, Khan said his
information was based on radio communications with his commanders at the scene.
He spoke in Dari and used the word ``shahr,'' which means city, in reporting on
the location of the troops. The Dari word for province is ``wilaiyat.'' The Taliban don't allow Western journalists into Kandahar and residents could
not be contacted by telephone. Seeking to rally his followers, Taliban supreme leader Mullah Mohammed Omar
urged his commanders in a radio message to defend their dwindling territory.
``The fight has now begun. It is the best opportunity to achieve martyrdom,''
a Taliban official quoted Omar as saying. ``Now we have the opportunity to fight
against the infidels,'' meaning non-Muslims. The Taliban official spoke by
telephone from the border town of Spinboldak on condition of anonymity. Kandahar residents arriving at the Pakistani border town of Chaman said the
Taliban appeared determined to defend Kandahar rather than abandon it as they
did Kabul, Herat and other cities. ``They gave the impression that they are ready to fight,'' said a man who
identified himself by the single name of Ataullah. However, Stufflebeem said it was unclear how many Taliban leaders would stick
with Omar, calling the Islamic movement ``fractured.'' ``There are some commanders who are negotiating for surrender of their
forces. There are others who might take Mullah Omar's orders literally and
intend to dig in defensively and fight to the death,'' Stufflebeem said. In the center of Kandahar, at an intersection called Martyr's Crossing, the
Taliban hanged a man they accused of pointing out potential bombing targets
after he was caught speaking on a satellite telephone, the Pakistan-based Afghan
Islamic Press reported. This week, the alliance's foreign minister, Abdullah, said the alliance was
dispatching Pashtun commanders to the south to work with Pashtuns who have
rebelled against the Taliban. Some Pashtuns — Afghanistan's dominant group — are
now coordinating operations with the alliance, which is mostly made up of ethnic
Tajiks and Uzbeks. Forces loyal to Mullah Naqib, a Pashtun guerrilla commander in the war
against the Soviets, and others allied with a former Kandahar governor, Gul Aga,
have been moving on Kandahar for days. Gul Aga's fighters claim they are within
1 1/2 miles of the Kandahar airport. More than 1,000 U.S. Marines began setting up a base in the desert of
southern Afghanistan last weekend in preparation for a showdown with the
Taliban. The Taliban had controlled about 95 percent of Afghanistan before the
northern alliance, backed by punishing U.S. airstrikes, forced them to abandon
Kabul and most of the country this month. Taliban fighters withdrew to the ethnic Pashtun areas of the south where
their movement was organized in the early 1990s. Taliban officials now claim to
control four of the 30 Afghan provinces. President Bush launched military operations against Afghanistan on Oct. 7
after the Taliban refused to hand over Osama bin Laden, the main suspect in the
Sept. 11 terrorist attacks in the United States. In other developments: — A U.S. official in Washington, speaking on condition of anonymity, said
there were credible reports that Taliban intelligence chief Qari Ahmadulla had
defected to northern alliance rebels. But a defense official said Ahmadulla was
still negotiating for his surrender in Kandahar. — At U.N.-sponsored talks in Germany, the northern alliance made a major
concession that could pave the way for international peacekeepers to restore
order in Afghanistan. The alliance dropped objections to an international force
to help secure the peace during an interim administration that will govern until
a council of tribal elders meets in March. — Alliance forces have captured Ahmed Abdel-Rahman, a bin Laden follower
whose father is jailed in the United States for plotting to blow up New York's
World Trade Center in 1993, according to several sources including U.S.
officials and a lawyer. — Three Russian cargo planes with food, medicine and equipment for relief
operations flew to Afghanistan, officials in Moscow said. In the north, the Red Cross and local health authorities continued clearing
the bodies of foreign fighters loyal to bin Laden who were killed when they
rebelled against their northern alliance captors. The fighters had been taken prisoner by the alliance but rose up in a
three-day rebellion that ended Tuesday at a fortress near Mazar-e-Sharif. Two
Afghans who were collecting bodies were wounded Thursday when survivors opened
fire on them, according to Simon Brooks, head of the Red Cross delegation in
Mazar-e-Sharif. CIA officer Johnny ``Mike'' Spann was killed in the rebellion and five U.S.
soldiers were wounded when a U.S. bomb meant to suppress the rebellion landed
off-target.
Associated Press Writer
U.S. special
forces troops stand in Mazar-e-Sharif
AP/Darko Bandic
Mohammed Yasen
sweeps a street in Kabul
AP/Laura Rauch