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| Afghanistan | |
| Northern Alliance claims significant gains | |
| 2001-10-07 | |
Opposition forces on Sunday claimed to have made significant gains in their fight against the Taliban militia in the north and west of Afghanistan, as US forces stood ready across the border in Uzbekistan. Opposition spokesmen said hundreds of Taliban soldiers had surrendered and 13 villages had been captured in northern Samangan province, bordering Uzbekistan, and western Ghor province during heavy fighting overnight and Sunday. Spokesman Mohammad Habeel told the Afghan Islamic Press that the anti-Taliban Northern Alliance, otherwise known as the United Front, had moved to within 1.5 km of Chaghcharan, the Ghor capital. Some 150 Taliban fighters joined opposition forces, he said, adding that Chaghcharan would fall "soon". The city sits on a road linking the western provinces to the north and centre of the country. In Samangan, opposition spokesman Mohammad Ashraf Nadeem said the Taliban lost two villages after a failed counter-attack designed to divert pressure from the strategic northern city of Mazar-i-Sharif. He said that eight Taliban commanders and 100 Taliban fighters surrendered to the opposition Sunday morning. "They surrendered because they had heard that America would attack the Taliban tonight (Sunday) and they were afraid," he told AFP by telephone from near the frontlines in northern Afghanistan. The opposition said they had advanced to within 50 km of Mazar-i-Sharif and could capture the city within two days. Its fall would give US forces in Uzbekistan, including 1,000 crack mountain troops, a base in northern Afghanistan from which to launch their expected attacks. Taliban Education Minister Mullah Amir Muttaqi denied that opposition troops had scored territorial gains in Samangan and Ghor provinces.
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| Posted by:Fred Pruitt |