December 1, 2001

Who's who of the Afghan power brokers.  Link to BBC News

Kabul's women list kidnap horrors By James Rupert

Quitting the Taliban And Blending Back In By Keith B. Richburg

Kabul Dispatch By Elizabeth Rubin

 


Bombs Rain on Kandahar, Afghans Near Deal
By Paul Holmes
Saturday December 1 11:56 AM ET
KABUL (Reuters) - U.S. bombers and Pashtun tribesmen clawed at the Taliban's last bastion of Kandahar on Saturday as Afghan factions appeared close to a power-sharing deal.

Neither king nor Rabbani to head Afghan interim govt: diplomats
Sunday December 2, 5:30 AM AFP
Neither Afghanistan's former king nor the Northern Alliance's president Burhanuddin Rabbani will head a new Afghan interim government, diplomats monitoring power-sharing talks in Germany told AFP.

Abdullah Says Afghan Talks 'Very Close to Deal'
Saturday December 1 10:54 AM ET
KABUL (Reuters) - The victorious Northern Alliance's foreign minister, Abdullah Abdullah, said on Saturday that Afghan talks aimed at creating a post-Taliban interim administration were ``very close to a deal.''

Afghan talks reach crunch point
Saturday, 1 December, 2001, 18:48 GMT BBC News
Delegates are expected to work through the night
Talks between the rival Afghan factions on new power-sharing institutions are entering a crucial phase.

Ethnic Balance Not the Point at Bonn Afghan Talks
By Tom Heneghan
Saturday December 1 10:55 AM ET
BONN, Germany (Reuters) - A future Afghan government must reflect the country's ethnic kaleidoscope, but the high- pressure talks in Germany on an interim administration are not the forum to do this

Afghan victors share out spoils, take battle to Kandahar
Sunday December 2, 1:38 AM AFP
The battle for Afghanistan entered its endgame as US-backed opposition forces closed on the Taliban's last stronghold and victorious opposition factions prepared a deal to share out power.

Kandahar prepares for showdown
Sunday, 2 December, 2001, 00:43 GMT BBC News
There are 1,000 US troops in the area
US aircraft have continued to pound the Taleban's last stronghold, the southern city of Kandahar, as anti-Taleban Pashtun forces take up position around the city.

Anti-terror coalition under fire for refusing massacre probe
Sunday December 2, 1:22 AM AFP
The US-led coalition fighting in Afghanistan and the Northern Alliance came under fire for ruling out an inquiry into the killing of hundreds of Taliban prisoners during a revolt in northern Afghanistan this week.

Survivors found at Mazar fort
Sunday, 2 December, 2001, 03:06 GMT BBC News
Red Cross workers have been clearing away the bodies
More than 80 survivors are reported to have come out alive from the ruins of an Afghan fort-prison where hundreds of their colleagues were killed in a three-day revolt earlier this week.

Terrified Afghans flee to Pakistan from Kandahar
By Zeeshan Haider
Sunday December 2, 3:43 AM
CHAMAN BORDER CROSSING, Pakistan (Reuters) - Afghans streamed toward Pakistan on Saturday, fleeing southern Afghanistan where a bloody struggle for the Taliban's last bastion of Kandahar was under way.

Imran Khan slams US Afghan war as counterproductive
Sunday December 2, 5:51 AM AFP
Pakistan's legendary cricketer-turned politician Imran Khan slammed in comments published here the US war on Afghanistan as "counterproductive against terrorism."

Taliban Holdouts Give Up at Fort, Looking Desperate
By CARLOTTA GALL
The New York Times
ALA JANGI, Afghanistan, Dec. 1 — Wounded, starving and near collapse after a week of relentless bombardment, more than 80 Taliban fighters, the last holdouts in a deadly prison uprising

U.S. denies bombs hit Afghan villages
December 1, 2001 Posted: 6:58 PM EST (2358 GMT)
JALALABAD, Afghanistan (CNN) --The U.S. Central Command Saturday denied claims that U.S. bombs dropped in airstrikes Friday killed 50 Afghan villagers and injured five others near Tora Bora

Army may use gas to smoke out bin Laden
BY MICHAEL EVANS, DEFENCE EDITOR
THE TIMES (UK) DECEMBER 1, 2001
OSAMA BIN LADEN could be flushed from his Tora Bora hideaway by military engineers drilling holes in the mountain and filling the cave complex with a disabling gas.

Silent Peril Lies in Wait for Afghanistan's People
Weapons: Unexploded bomblets' toll on civilians has renewed controversy over their use.
By PAUL WATSON and LISA GETTER
Los Angeles Times (Dec 1, 2001)
KALAKAN, Afghanistan -- More than two weeks after the last U.S. cluster bomb struck Taliban troops in this front-line village, lethal bomblets still litter the dirt paths and fields

Foreign Diplomats Jockey for Position in Kabul
By MICHAEL R. GORDON
The New York Times
KABUL, Afghanistan, Dec. 1 — The Iranians were the first to arrive. Just a day after Northern Alliance forces swept into Kabul, a small group of Iranian diplomats turned up at their abandoned

UN urged to put Taliban chiefs on trial for 'ethnic cleansing'
By Justin Huggler
The Independent (UK) 01 December 2001
Northern Alliance commanders called on the United Nations yesterday to prosecute Taliban leaders for war crimes, including ethnic cleansing.

US planes rain death on the innocent
'Precision' raids kill residents in capital city
Rory McCarthy in Kabul
Saturday December 1, 2001
The Guardian (UK)
The people of Bibi Mahru had come to believe in American surgical strikes and precision bombing. Before the US military campaign in Afghanistan started, many families fled the village

Defection reunites brothers
By David Filipov, Boston Globe Staff, 12/1/2001
UNDUZ, Afghanistan - Northern Alliance commander Hanon sat silently at the hearth of his boyhood home in the town he fought so hard to liberate from the Taliban

UNICEF Chief Praises Afghan School
By GREG MYRE, Associated Press Writer
Saturday December 1 11:31 AM ET
KABUL, Afghanistan (AP) - Touring a home-based school that defied the Taliban's ban on female education, U.N. Children's Fund chief Carol Bellamy on Saturday praised the dedication

Kabul Zoo Gets Helping Hand
By GARY D. ROBERTSON, Associated Press Writer
Saturday December 1 7:11 AM ET
RALEIGH, N.C. (AP) - The last time David Jones visited the 100-acre zoo in Afghanistan's capital, he admired bears and mountain goats native to the land as herds of red deer grazed peacefully.

Disloyalty pays in the treacherous world of the warlord
By Marcus Warren in Kabul
The Telegraph (UK) December 1, 2001
TIMING is all in the treacherous world of the Afghan warlord, a truth illustrated all too well by Commander Karim, a former Taliban military chief who recently defected to the winning side for the third time

Kabul Retraces Steps to Life Before Taliban
By BARRY BEARAK
The New York Times
KABUL, Afghanistan, Dec. 1 — Dr. Nazifa Tabibzada cut into the abdomen of someone named Abdul last week. It was a routine procedure for a reliable surgeon, remarkable only because she had not operated

Pashtun tribal leaders grow rich on conflict
BY CATHERINE PHILP IN QUETTA
THE TIMES (UK) DECEMBER 1, 2001
MUHAMMAD AKRAM is not happy with the Americans. Not because they are waging war in his homeland, but because they won’t let him join in. “I could have hundreds of men ready to fight within hours

US says no Afghanistan peace-keepers until war is over
By Kim Sengupta and Mary Dejevsky in Bonn
The Independent (UK) 01 December 2001
America ruled out the deployment of an international peace-keeping force in Afghan-istan yesterday ­ at least until it finishes its military campaign on the ground.

U.S. Wants Custody Of Enemy Leaders
Interrogation, Trials of Al Qaeda, Taliban Eyed
By Vernon Loeb and Susan Schmidt
Washington Post Staff Writers
Saturday, December 1, 2001; Page A01
Defense Secretary Donald H. Rumsfeld said yesterday that the United States has told opposition commanders in Afghanistan that it wants any senior Taliban or al Qaeda members captured

Taliban offer £30,000 a head to kill reporters
Mullah Omar offer as media deaths mount
Ian Traynor
Friday November 30, 2001 The Guardian
Mullah Mohammed Omar has promised Afghans blood money for the murder of western journalists.

End of dark days for Afghan Hindus
The Times of India December 1, 2001
KABUL: The Northern Alliance administration, now in control of Kabul, on Friday lifted all religious restrictions imposed by the hardline Taliban in Afghanistan, saying the dark years are over.

Sayyaf due in Peshawar along with held Pakistanis
By Sami Yusufzai
The News: Jang (Pakistan) December 1, 2001
KABUL: Northern Alliance leader Professor Abdur Rab Rasool Sayyaf would take a large number of Pakistanis detained in Afghanistan to Peshawar during the next few days, sources said here Friday.

Hekmatyar says US selects Bonn moot invitees
Islamabad, Dec 1, IRNA -- Former Afghan Prime Minister and Chief of Hizb-e-Islami Engineer Hekmatyar has said no dignified Jihadi leader has attended the Bonn meeting as the United States

Last two Jews in Afghanistan won't talk to each other
By Javier Otazu
Kabul, Nov 30, 2001 (EFE via COMTEX) -- The last two Jews in Afghanistan live in the same Kabul building but haven't spoken to each other in years.

Rabbani says his delegation in Bonn has limited authority
Kabul, Dec 1, IRNA -- The president of the Islamic Afghan government Burhanuddin Rabbani said his delegation in the Bonn conference, has been given a limited authority and is not in a position

OIC says it wasn't invited to Bonn talks
Frontier Post
JEDDAH (NNI): The Organization of the Islamic Conference, the world's largest Muslim political body which has for decades been involved in peacemaking efforts in Afghanistan

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N.Alliance May Strike Afghan Deal Without Kabul
By Mehrdad Balali
Saturday December 1 7:39 AM ET
BONN, Germany (Reuters) - Northern Alliance top delegate Yunis Qanuni threatened on Saturday to ignore his hesitating leader Burhanuddin Rabbani and strike a deal with exile groups

Afghan Talks Should End Sat. Night -Delegate
Saturday December 1 7:51 AM ET
BONN, Germany (Reuters) - U.N.-sponsored talks on a future Afghan government should reach agreement on Saturday night and present it on Sunday, the head of one of the four delegations said on Saturday.

Alliance Ready to Seal Deal at Afghan Talks
By Mehrdad Balali
Saturday December 1 8:18 AM ET
BONN, Germany (Reuters) - Afghan rivals made a final push toward forming a post-Taliban government on Saturday as the dominant Northern Alliance appeared to put aside internal differences

Brahimi appeals to Northern Alliance's Rabbani to be flexible
Saturday December 1, 5:56 PM AFP
UN special representative for Afghanistan Lakhdar Brahimi has appealed personally in a telephone call to the political leader of the Northern Alliance, ousted president Burhanuddin Rabbani

UN bid to beat Afghan peace talk logjam as Taliban vow resistance
Saturday December 1, 9:03 PM AFP
International officials scrambled to save Afghan power-sharing talks from deadlock on Saturday while US forces in southern Afghanistan faced a bloody showdown with the Taliban.

Pressure builds for Afghan settlement
Saturday, 1 December, 2001, 11:03 GMT BBC News
Under intense international pressure to agree
Pressure is increasing on Afghan faction leaders meeting in Germany to agree on an interim government by the end of Saturday.

U.S. Bombers Hit Taliban Redoubt, Afghans Near Deal
By Sayed Salahuddin and Zeeshan Haider
Saturday December 1 8:17 AM ET
KABUL/CHAMAN, Pakistan (Reuters) - U.S. bombing and tribal warriors racked up pressure on the Taliban's last bastion of Kandahar on Saturday as anti-Taliban factions pursued efforts

U.S. Denies Taliban Shot Down Warplane
Saturday December 1 7:35 AM ET
WASHINGTON (Reuters) - The U.S. military on Saturday denied a report from the Taliban that the Afghan militia had shot down an American warplane over the besieged southern city of Kandahar.

Bin Laden 'bought off' Taleban
Saturday, 1 December, 2001, 13:12 GMT BBC News
Osama bin Laden had Taleban leaders in his pocket, frequently buying them off with huge cash payments, a senior defector from Afghanistan's former ruling movement has said.

Powell to make eleven-nation Afghan policy tour
By Elaine Monaghan
Saturday December 1, 11:05 AM
WASHINGTON (Reuters) - U.S. Secretary of State Colin Powell has added Germany, Britain and France to a nine-day trip he will make next week to Europe and Central Asia to help shape Afghanistan's future

Blair urges caution on massacre claims
By Joshua Rozenberg and Andrew Sparrow
Daily Telegraph (UK) (Nov 30, 2001)
TONY BLAIR urged the public last night not to believe all of the reports from Afghanistan about the killing of Taliban prisoners.

Anti-terror coalition under fire for refusing massacre probe
Saturday December 1, 10:10 AM AFP
The US-led coalition fighting in Afghanistan and the Northern Alliance came under fire for ruling out an inquiry into the killing of hundreds of Taliban prisoners during a revolt in northern Afghanistan this week.