Posted on 03/13/2004 2:07:48 AM PST by Anti-Bubba182
KABUL (Reuters) - U.S.-led forces have launched a sweeping new hunt in Afghanistan's remote southern and eastern mountains where Taliban and al Qaeda fighters, including Osama bin Laden, are believed to be in hiding.
The operation, codenamed "Mountain Storm", began on March 7 and involved troops from the 13,500-strong U.S.-led force backed by air support, U.S. military spokesman Lieutenant-Colonel Bryan Hilferty told a news briefing on Saturday.
"We believe that this will help bring the heads of the terrorist organisations to justice by continuing to place pressure on them," he said.
Asked whether the operation could lead to the arrest of al Qaeda leader bin Laden, Hilferty replied:
"This operation is aimed like the rest at rebuilding and reconstructing and providing enduring security in Afghanistan, so it's certainly about more than one person.
"We do have confidence though, and the leaders of al Qaeda and the leaders of the Taliban need to be brought to justice and they will be."
Hilferty said "Mountain Storm" was a continuation of previous operations and involved patrols, searches and small-scale air assaults. But he declined to provide details.
"We have air support, close-fire support from the air 24-hours a day, circling overhead ready to assist coalition forces. It is a continuing effort to keep pressure on the terrorist organisations and their infrastructure."
The fresh campaign comes after a surge in militant attacks on aid workers and foreigners, as well as against Afghan and U.S.-led forces.
U.S. defence officials in Washington on Friday described "Mountain Storm" as a broad spring offensive to hunt down al Qaeda fugitives, including bin Laden.
The officials, speaking on condition of anonymity, told Reuters it was timed to exploit improving weather in the region between Afghanistan and Pakistan, where bin Laden is believed to be.
A Taliban spokesman said U.S. forces had launched an offensive in at least two eastern provinces but elusive Taliban leader, Mullah Mohammed Omar, who headed the Afghan Taliban government that harboured the al Qaeda network, was safe.
"Mullah Omar is in a very safe place. But we don't know about Osama bin Laden," Taliban official Abdul Latif Hakimi told Reuters by telephone.
SECRET TASK FORCE
U.S. officials said the secretive Task Force 121, a covert commando team of Special Operations troops and CIA personnel involved in the capture of Saddam Hussein in Iraq in December, has relocated people and equipment to the border region to search for bin Laden and other al Qaeda and Taliban guerrillas.
Pakistan has in recent weeks moved forces into the lawless tribal lands on its side of the Afghan border in the search for militants. Hilferty said the Pakistanis had done "a great job".
Lieutenant-General David Barno, the top U.S. general in Afghanistan, said last month the United States and Pakistan were moving toward coordinated operations along the border -- "a hammer and anvil approach" -- to prevent fleeing guerrillas from escaping by crossing from one country to the other.
Pakistani military spokesman Major-General Shaukat Sultan dismissed the suggestion Pakistan represented the "anvil" but said militants would not be able to cross the border.
"We are doing the surveillance, we are carrying out regular patrolling to ensure that the border if effectively sealed off." U.S.-led forces toppled the Taliban in late 2001, in an invasion launched in the wake of the September 11 attacks on U.S. cities, for which al Qaeda is blamed.
Defence Secretary Donald Rumsfeld has declined to add his voice to predictions by some U.S. military officers in Afghanistan that bin Laden will be caught this year.
"I'm not going to get into that," Rumsfeld told Reuters in a recent interview. "He's probably alive. And he's probably in Afghanistan or Pakistan. And we're probably going to catch him or kill him."
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