Khwaja Bahauddin, Afghanistan | Monday
US B-52 bombers unleashed their heaviest payloads on Taliban frontline positions on Sunday as militia and opposition forces battled for a key district in northern Afghanistan.
US Defence Secretary Donald Rumsfeld meanwhile defended plans to carry on raids through the Muslim holy month of Ramadan saying there was a real threat of more terrorist attacks that “offer the prospect of still thousands more people being killed.”
The US military campaign entered a fifth week with at least 100 bombs dropped on Taliban positions in the northeast near the frontier with Tajikistan, witnesses said.
B-52 bombers flying over the Kokcha River hammered a hillside where the Taliban were dug in, producing a wall of black and grey smoke and explosions that shook nearby villages.
The raid was the largest on Taliban troops arrayed against opposition Northern Alliance fighters in the battle for control of northeastern transport routes into Tajikistan ahead of winter.
A Pentagon representative said in Washington that 65 strike aircraft were used, including up to eight long-range bombers.
The number of bombs dropped in five hours exceeded the total for four previous strikes on the area in the last week.
Following talks in Islamabad with Pakistan’s President Pervez Musharraf, the US defence secretary indicated air strikes would continue through Ramadan because of the threat of more terror attacks.
Rumsfeld told a news conference that Washington was “sensitive” to the feeling of Muslim nations over Ramadan, which is due to start in mid-November.
But he added: “The reality is that the threat of additional terrorist acts are there. They are credible, they are real and they offer the prospect of still thousands more people being killed.
“Our task is certainly to be sensitive to the views of the region but also to see that we aggressively deal with the terrorist networks that exist.”
Rumsfeld said the Taliban only had military authority in Afghanistan.
“The Taliban are not really functioning as a government. There is really not a government to speak of in Afghanistan,” Rumsfeld said.
“As a military force they have concentrations of power that exist. They have capabilities that remain,” he said, citing an array of Taliban weaponry from tanks to anti-aircraft Stinger missiles.
After four weeks of sustained US-led aerial attacks, Rumsfeld said the Taliban’s capacity to govern had been reduced to military coercion.
“They are using their power in enclaves throughout the country to impose their will on the Afghan people,” he said.
The Northern Alliance controls about 10% of Afghanistan in the north and has said it is preparing a major offensive against Taliban positions and eventually Kabul. But there was no sign of an offensive Sunday.
The onset of winter could thwart any short-term bid by the opposition to grab the shattered Afghan capital until the spring thaw. Further east, the alliance confirmed it had lost ground to the Taliban.
Qari Qudratullah, a representative for Northern Alliance commander Atta Mohammad, said the Taliban recaptured part of a key northern Afghanistan district early Sunday after almost 12 hours of fierce fighting.
He said the Taliban had taken back the eastern part of Aq-Kupruk district, 70 kilometers south of the northern capital of Mazar-i-Sharif after attacks were launched from 2:00 pm on Saturday until early Sunday morning.
The Taliban ambassador to Pakistan was quoted as saying late on Saturday that the Islamic militia had completely retaken Aq-Kupruk.
“There was fierce fighting and eventually the Taliban made an advance. They are now in control of the eastern part of Aq-Kupruk.
But we are preparing to launch a counter-attack,” Qudratullah said.
“For the time being the town of Aq-Kupruk is a battleground,” said the anti-Taliban spokesman.
Taliban positions in Aq-Kupruk and nearby Keshender came under heavy bombardment on Sunday morning, said Abdul Hanan Hemat, head of the Bakhtar information agency.
If the opposition can take and hold Aq-Kupruk it would mark their first significant advance towards Mazar-i-Sharif since US-led forces began bombing targets in Afghanistan nearly a month ago. – AFP