Islamabad | Thursday
PAKISTAN has ordered a special watch on its border with Afghanistan in case terrorist suspect Osama bin Laden tries to slip across, officials said on Thursday.
With pressure mounting on the Taliban headquarters in the southern Afghan province of Kandahar, next to the Pakistan border, a top Pakistan government official said troops were on a special ”Osama” alert.
”The government is aware of all possibilities and is taking all possibilities into account,” said the unnamed official.
”Civil armed forces on the western borders in North West Frontier Province and Baluchistan borders have been put on red alert against any threat” of bin Laden getting into Pakistan.
Taliban representatives have regularly insisted that Taliban leader Mullah Mohammad Omar, and his ally bin Laden, the Saudi dissident accused of masterminding the September 11 attacks on New York and Washington, are alive and still in Afghanistan.
The fate of Kandahar, where bin Laden’s residence has been destroyed in US bombing strikes that started on September 11, remains unclear however.
Northern Alliance and independent local commanders are taking over Taliban territory closer and closer to Kandahar.
A Northern Alliance envoy in Tajikistan said the Taliban had fled its spiritual headquarters. US defence department officials have said only that Pashtun tribes had risen up against the Taliban around Kandahar. – Sapa-AFP
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Shattered World: A Daily Mail & Guardian special on the attack on the US
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