The Associated Press On Saturday, residents of Kabul,
Afghanistan, walk over the rubble of four houses near the airport
destroyed by alliance bombing Friday night. Some said at least one
civilian was killed.
By Kathy Gannon and Amir
Shah
The Associated Press
KABUL, Afghanistan “”mdash; Huge explosions shook the Afghan
capital throughout the day Monday with two more jets reported
attacking the northern part of the city early Tuesday.
The Monday air strikes sent terrified residents scurrying for
shelter, as U.S. jets pounded suspected weapons storage sites in
Kabul and across the country.
Defense Secretary Donald H. Rumsfeld, speaking at the Pentagon,
suggested U.S. airstrikes could start targeting Taliban front-line
positions facing Afghan opposition fighters in the northeast of the
country.
The opposition alliance claimed Monday it had advanced close to
Mazar-e-Sharif, the largest city in the north, and that some 4,000
Taliban troops defected over the weekend. The Taliban denied the
defection claim.
The attacks Monday against Kabul started just before sunrise and
continued through the day into the night. Taliban gunners fired in
vain at the attacking planes, some so high they could not be heard
from the ground.
The attacks in Kabul appeared to be directed at weapons and
ammunition storage sites in the hills north of the city of 1
million people and around the airport.
In one nighttime raid, 10 huge explosions in the direction of
the airport shook buildings miles away.
One bomb exploded near a U.N. World Food Program warehouse on
the northern edge of Kabul, slightly injuring one Afghan employee,
U.N. spokesman Khaled Mansour said in Pakistan.
In the Jalalabad area of eastern Afghanistan, U.S. jets struck
the regional military headquarters near the airport and Tora-Bora,
a suspected terrorist training camp of Osama bin Laden.
An Afghan refugee arriving in the Pakistani border town of
Chaman said a suspected ammunition depot in Kandahar, the southern
city where the Taliban leadership is based, was ablaze after a hit
Monday by U.S. missiles.
The United States launched the air campaign on Oct. 7 to root
out bin Laden ““ the top suspect in the Sept. 11 terror
attacks in the United States ““ and to punish
Afghanistan’s rulers, the Taliban hard-line Islamic militia,
who harbor him.
Rumsfeld said warplanes had dropped leaflets over Afghanistan
for the first time Monday.
In other developments Monday:
“¢bull; In neighboring Pakistan, pro-Taliban Islamic militants
closed thousands of shops throughout the country and clashed with
police to demand an end to the bombing campaign. But compliance
with the strike was limited, and some shops were open even in
border cities where sympathy with Taliban is high.
“¢bull; U.S. Secretary of State Colin Powell arrived in Pakistan
to meet with President Pervez Musharraf and discuss reopening
military ties.
“¢bull; The USS Theodore Roosevelt was getting into position in
the region, bringing to four the number of aircraft carriers
involved in the campaign.
“¢bull; The U.S. military has paid millions to buy exclusive
rights to some of the commercial sector’s best satellite
imagery of Afghanistan ““ aiming to prevent the Taliban from
getting hold of it.
The Taliban Information Ministry claimed 12 people died Monday
during a raid in western Badgus province. The Taliban said some 200
civilians were killed Thursday when U.S. jets attacked the village
of Karam in eastern Afghanistan.
In Washington, Rumsfeld said some of the Taliban casualty claims
were “ridiculous.” But he acknowledged that some Afghan
civilians have been killed unintentionally, without offering
specific numbers.
He said U.S. planes have so far avoided striking Taliban
positions on the front lines because of incomplete targeting
information. But he said that might soon change.
“I suspect that in the period ahead that’s not going
to be a very safe place to be” for Taliban fighters, he said.
“We hope to have improved targeting information in the period
ahead.
Pakistan, a key U.S. ally, has pressed for the U.S.-led air
campaign not to directly help opposition troops. Pakistan fears the
northern alliance, its longtime opponent, will seize power from the
Taliban.
The Afghan opposition said Monday its troops had advanced to
within three miles of the airport at Mazar-e-Sharif, a strategic
city the Taliban have held since 1998.
“Thank God, the Taliban forces are unable to take the help
of their air forces,” opposition spokesman Mohammed Ashraf
Nadeem said.
The claim could not be independently verified, and the Taliban
had no immediate comment.
But Taliban officials denied an opposition claim that 4,000 of
the militia’s fighters under a single commander had
surrendered to rebel troops on Sunday. Taliban Information Minister
Qudratullah Jamal said the commander in question had never had so
many soldiers under his authority.