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Posted on 10/02/2001 9:39:03 PM PDT by kattracks

• Afghan Rulers Want Evidence Of Bin Laden Involvement
• Officials Fanning Out To Shore Up Support
• World Leaders Warn That Military Action Is Inevitable
  
  

ISLAMABAD, Oct. 2, 2001

AP
Taliban fighters stand guard (undated photo.)

(CBS) Afghanistan's ruling Taliban said they did not want a war with the United States and called once again for direct talks and evidence linking Osama bin Laden to the bloody September 11 attacks there.

Taliban ambassador to Pakistan Mullah Abdul Salam Zaeef told CNN in an interview that the suicide hijacking attacks on New York and Washington were not Islamic and suggested that they would hand over Osama bin Laden if any link could be proved.

"We prefer the negotiations than the war," he said. "The negotiations are the way of solving our problems."

The latest comments follow a steady escalation of tension between the Taliban and the United States as the American military buildup in the Gulf continues.

In the Afghan capital Tuesday, the Taliban put their military might on display. Aging Soviet tanks and rocket-launchers left over from the 1980s rolled through the center of Kabul like some dusty echo of a May Day parade in Red Square.

With the world's most modern military force gathering against a state modeled on a society that existed more than 1,300 years ago, the puritanical Taliban pitched the crisis as a battle of Islam versus the United States.

Officials said ministers were moving around the country, some traveling from the capital, Kabul, to confer with their spiritual and supreme leader, Mullah Mohammad Omar, in his southern stronghold of Kandahar and others fanning out to win the hearts and minds of soldiers and civilians.

Some Afghans who fled in recent days say Taliban authorities are dragging young men off to the army and using the internal crisis to settle ancient tribal scores.

Across a swath of northern Afghanistan, fierce but scattered fighting persisted between the opposition alliance and Taliban troops. Taliban officials quoted by the Afghan Islamic Press said Monday their troops had retaken the district of Qadis in northeastern Bagdis province — whose capture the rebels had reported only a day earlier.

Anti-American fury broke out in neighboring Pakistan, Tuesday. The border town of Quetta was the site of a demonstration that police said would be dangerous for foreigners -- especially Americans.

But the target of anger was as much the Pakistani government as it was the United States.

Shouts of "Afghanistan is America's graveyard" were mixed with cries calling Pakistani leader General Pervez Musharraf "Washington's dog," reports CBS News Correspondent Allen Pizzey.

The march was organized by a pro-Taliban religious party. And the Afghan ambassador showed up later to make an appeal for what he termed negotiations instead of war.

Meanwhile, a growing number of world leaders are warning Afghanistan that bin Laden appears to be behind the Sept. 11 terrorist attacks in New York and Washington and that military consequences are inevitable unless he is handed over to the U.S.

In a speech Tuesday to a Labor Party conference, British Prime Minister Tony Blair said U.S.-led strikes will be directed at bin Laden's training camps and the Taliban's military hardware unless bin Laden is surrendered.

In the south and southwest areas of Afghanistan, ministers were in talks with the tribal leaders, who traditionally hold great sway, to muster support and prevent any uprisings by restless clans.

Others were forging new alliances and urging their troops to defend the cause of the movement whose hardline Islamic government last week marked its fifth anniversary of the capture of the capital.

Thousands of Afghans gathered in the southern city of Kandahar and burnt effigies of President George W. Bush and the former Afghan king.

Striving to shore up their rule and prevent internal disintegration, the Taliban struck a deal a day earlier with tribal elders in three eastern provinces.

The Taliban has said it is holding bin Laden for his own safety and cannot surrender him without evidence, although a council of 1,000 clerics last month recommended that he leave of his own free will. That message had been passed to him.

“In a sign the Taliban realizes the danger, Omar took the unusual step of speaking to his people late on Sunday over his Voice of Shariat Radio, warning ex-King Mohammad Zahir Shah not to meddle in Afghanistan's affairs.

“Forget Afghanistan. You won't be able to solve the issue of Afghanistan in your lifetime,” the reclusive Taliban leader said.

The 86-year-old ex-king, deposed and exiled by his cousin in 1973, on Monday struck an agreement with the the United Front, formerly referred to as the Northern Alliance, to convene a council of Afghan leaders and pave the way for the election of a head of state and transitional government.

CBS News Correspondent Elizabeth Palmerreports that there is some confusion as to whether or not the king would push to have some Taliban representatives included on this tribal council. If he does, it’s bound to be very, very controversial.

The U.N. refugee agency said Tuesday that it had flown more emergency aid to Pakistan to help a steady stream of fleeing Afghans.

Kris Janowski, spokesman for the U.N. High Commissioner for Refugees, said a plane carrying 45 tons of blankets and plastic sheets arrived in Pakistan early Monday. Aid agencies have warned that the onset of winter will worsen the situation Afghans face, and slow down deliveries of supplies.

Meanwhile, an earthquake with a reported magnitude of 5.0 shook a remote region of mountainous northern Afghanistan Tuesday morning, the Pakistan Seismological Center reported. There were no immediate indications of damage or injuries.

©MMI, CBS Worldwide Inc. All Rights Reserved. The Associated Press and Reuters Limited contributed to this report.

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