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U.S. keeps lists for Afghan war
11/30/2001
By PAULINE JELINEK WASHINGTON — Two lists are kept at the command center for the war in
Afghanistan — one with al-Qaida leaders that marks them "inj" for injured or
"kia" for killed. The other is for the Taliban, color-coded to show those defecting, injured or
negotiating to surrender — targets for questioning by Americans in the hunt for
Osama bin Laden. ``There have been defections ... of some of the more senior people,''
Pentagon spokeswoman Victoria Clarke said Thursday. She declined to name them or
give their positions. Among those the Pentagon would like to interrogate are two Taliban ministers,
including intelligence chief Qari Ahmadulla. A U.S. official, speaking on condition of anonymity, said there were credible
reports that Ahmadulla had defected to northern alliance rebels. But a defense official said Ahmadulla was still negotiating for his surrender
in Kandahar, the southern Taliban stronghold that tribal leaders have been
fighting to take over. U.S. troops have been allowed by opposition groups to question other
defectors and prisoners who have surrendered or been captured, a senior defense
official said. The hope is that they can provide crucial information that will lead to
finding Taliban and al-Qaida leaders, as well as sites they may use to hide
weapons stashes, financial records and so on. The Pentagon is just starting to receive and evaluate the information from
such interrogations, the official said, declining to say who had been
questioned. Of the more than three dozen Taliban the Pentagon has on its list, some 12
have been killed, injured or have defected, said one defense official who has
seen it. He didn't say how many had been questioned. The list is part of a PowerPoint computer-generated slide presentation
sometimes used to brief the war's commander, Gen. Tommy Franks, at Central
Command headquarters in Tampa, Fla. As for the fate of al-Qaida figures, after nearly two months of U.S. bombing
in Afghanistan, seven al-Qaida leaders and senior aides are believed killed.
Many from bin Laden's top echelons are alive. The most significant killed so far was Mohammed Atef, one of the top two
advisers to bin Laden, who died in a CIA-assisted U.S. airstrike around Nov. 14.
Atef was bin Laden's operational planner and believed to have supervised
planning for several attacks, including the Sept. 11 attacks. Two others considered in al-Qaida's ``top 20'' are believed dead after U.S.
bombing in early November near the Afghan-Pakistan border, military and other
officials say. They were identified as Mohammed Salah and Tariq Anwar al-Sayyid
Ahmad, both from Egypt. Several hundred rank-and-file al-Qaida members are believed dead, but the
list Franks is said to be using only includes the top two dozen figures.
Vice President Dick Cheney told ABC News Thursday that the northern alliance
had captured Ahmed Abdel-Rahman, son of the Egyptian cleric Omar Abdel-Rahman,
the ``blind sheik'' who is jailed in the United States for plotting
assassinations and bombings of New York City landmarks. Ahmed Abdel-Rahman worked as a liason between al-Qaida and al-Gama'a
al-Islamiyya, an Egyptian terrorist organization with strong ties to bin Laden's
group, said a U.S. official, speaking on the condition of anonymity. He was not
considered among al-Qaida's most wanted, but the official described him as a key
figure in the group. ``He constitutes a major catch because he was in the second tier of al-Qaida
operations in Afghanistan,'' said Haron Amin, U.S. envoy for the northern
alliance in Washington. ``I think a lot of information is going to come out of
him.'' Cheney suggested Abdel-Rahman was likely to face trial before a U.S. military
tribunal. ``We have been involved. We've got people on the ground who are helping
interrogate and screen these folks that are being held,'' Cheney said.
Associated Press Writer