|
ISLAMABAD, Pakistan (AP) In a new bid to break the deadlock
over Osama bin Laden, Pakistani religious leaders and government
officials met Afghanistan's Taliban Friday to try to press them to
surrender bin Laden or force him to leave the country.
The daylong talks ended with no immediate word on the outcome.
A terse one-line report from Afghanistan's official Bakhtar news
agency said the "delegations had met and discussed the
situation." It gave no details.
In Pakistan, the first of a series of planeloads of food aid
earmarked for Afghan refugees arrived in the border city of
Peshawar, where several thousand angry demonstrators protested
against Pakistan's support for the United States in the crisis.
Worshippers in Kabul, the Afghan capital, called on God to bring
down America after Friday Muslim prayers.
The Pakistani delegation's visit to Afghanistan came a day after
the Taliban delivered a message to bin Laden, the prime suspect in
the Sept. 11 terror attacks on the United States, asking him to
leave the country voluntarily. It was the first indication from the
Taliban that they knew where bin Laden was, or how to communicate
with him.
In an apparent bid to find allies in the crisis, the Taliban
asked for a special meeting of the Organization of the Islamic
Conference, which groups 57 Muslim nations. Sohail Shaheen, a
spokesman of the Taliban embassy in Islamabad, said the Taliban
wanted the session to discuss the attacks and "help in getting the
culprits." Pakistani officials said the meeting would probably be
held Oct. 9 in Doha, Qatar.
President Bush has demanded the Taliban surrender bin Laden or
share his fate, raising expectations of an American-led military
action against Afghanistan, though none has yet materialized and
American officials now say none is imminent.
The Taliban ambassador in neighboring Pakistan, Mullah Abdul
Salam Zaeef, accompanied the Pakistani delegation to Afghanistan's
southern city of Kandahar, the Taliban's home base. He confirmed in
a statement to the Afghan Islamic Press agency that the team
which included Gen. Mahmood Ahmed, the head of Pakistan's
intelligence service was to meet with the reclusive Taliban
leader, Mullah Mohammed Omar, and was expected to fly back Friday
night.
A second delegation, consisting of clerics from Pakistan's main
Islamic parties, said it hoped to travel to Afghanistan in coming
days.
Officials would spell out the delegation's message to the
Taliban. But Riaz Mohammed Khan, a spokesman for Pakistan's Foreign
Office, said: "In view of the gravity of the situation, the Afghan
leadership should be responsive to what the world is expecting of
them."
Gen. Rashid Qureshi, spokesman of Pakistan's military
government, said the contact reflected Pakistan's determination to
help resolve the standoff between the United States and the
Taliban, Afghanistan's hard-line leaders.
"It is a continuation of the diplomatic contacts Pakistan has
with the Afghan government to persuade them of the need to address
the concerns of the United States and the world community," he
told The Associated Press. "Pakistan will continue to try its best
to resolve the crisis amicably."
Pakistan's decision to support the United States including
possible use of its airspace and territory as staging ground for
any military strikes has drawn fury from hard-line Islamic groups
inside the country, and more protests erupted on Friday.
In Islamabad, the country's biggest Sunni Muslim party,
Sipah-e-Sahaba, staged a raucous protest near a central mosque
after Friday's prayers, the most important of the Muslim week.
Protesters carried placards reading "Osama is our hero" and
"Anyone who supports America is a traitor." They burned U.S. and
U.N. flags and an effigy of Bush.
A delegation of students from another Islamic party handed over
a letter to the main United Nations office in Islamabad, demanding
that there be no U.S. strike on Afghanistan.
In Peshawar near the Afghan border, several thousand protesters
chanted "Death to America!" and vowed to make Afghanistan a
"graveyard" for American forces, while hundreds of riot police
watched.
Maulana Sami ul-Haq leader of the Jamiat Ulema Islam party,
which has close ties to the Taliban called on protesters to be
ready to sacrifice themselves for Afghanistan. "My brothers, be
prepared to shed blood," he said.
0 In Afghanistan, worshippers at the main mosque in the capital,
Kabul, called on God to punish the "arrogance" of the United
States. The mullah told them in his sermon that Afghans "will
never bow" before the United States.
Amid fears of war, hundreds of thousands of refugees have been
on the move inside Afghanistan, and the United Nations has warned
of a burgeoning humanitarian crisis, with food stocks dwindling and
the start of the harsh Afghan winter is only six weeks away.
The first of several planeloads of food being flown to
Afghanistan's neighbors by the World Food Program arrived Friday in
the Pakistani border city of Peshawar, the WFP said.
Kabul Radio denied reports of food shortages in the capital and
major provinces. A broadcast monitored Thursday in Islamabad quoted
senior municipal officials as saying there was enough food in
markets and assuring residents "we have sufficient stocks
available in Kabul and other provinces."
|