M A I N   N E W S

Heaviest daylight attacks on Kabul

Kabul, October 15
In the heaviest daylight attacks so far, US Jets pounded targets around Kabul today and attacked military headquarters and a suspected terrorist training camp near the eastern city of Jalalabad.

The stepped-up attacks came a day after US President George W. Bush rebuffed the Taliban’s latest offer to negotiate Osama bin Laden’s surrender — if Mr Bush would call off the bombing.

The ninth day of raids opened with jets streaking across the dawn sky over Kabul, striking in the area of the airport and a military base.

Throughout the day, wave after wave of bombers, some too high to be heard in the streets below, pounded suspected military targets in the north-west of the capital.

In Afghanistan’s east, a lone jet bombed the western outskirts of Jalalabad as shoppers went about their errands at an open market in the city centre.

US warplanes returned hours later, striking the military headquarters near the airport, the Bin Laden training camp at Tora-Bora and a third target near Karam village, where the Taliban say that up to 200 persons were killed when US jets devastated the hamlet last week.

Taliban soldiers patrolled Jalalabad with rocket launchers and assault rifles as the raids were underway.

“The Taliban just laugh at these bombs,” said Mufti Yousuf, a Taliban envoy accompanying international journalists to Jalalabad. AP

5 civilians killed in Mazar: UN

Islamabad, October 15
The United Nations said today five civilians were killed when a US bomb fell near a crowded market in the northern Afghan city of Mazar-i-Sharif.

The bomb exploded “in close proximity” to the market on Friday, UN spokeswoman Stephanie Bunker told reporters in Islamabad.

Mazar-i-Sharif is a strategic city in the north of the country which opposition forces are attempting to reclaim from the Taliban. AFP

Real war yet to begin: Omar

Dubai, October 15
Taliban supreme leader Mullah Muhammad Omar said his Islamic militia will teach the USA “a much more bitter lesson” than what the Soviet Union was taught in the 1980s.

In a telephone interview with Saudi daily Al-Watan on Sunday he said: “It’s true that we have not started our real battle against the USA because of their technological superiority. But they will be taught a much more bitter lesson.” ANI

Iraq ‘fires’ missiles at US, UK warplanes

Baghdad, October 15
Baghdad today said it fired missiles at US and British warplanes overflying southern Iraq, forcing them to return to their bases in Saudi Arabia and Kuwait.

"Enemy warplanes" flying from Kuwait and Saudi Arabia and backed by an AWACS reconnaissance aircraft flew nine sorties over the provinces of Zi Qar, Muthanna and Wasit in southern Iraq, said a military spokesman, quoted by the official INA news agency. AFP

Anthrax in Senator's letter: Bush

Washington, October 15
A letter opened in the office of US Senate majority leader Tom Daschle "had anthrax in it," President George W. Bush said today.

Mr Bush said the envelope was field-tested shortly after being received and the staffers who had been exposed were being treated. Speaking to reporters at the White House as he welcomed Italian Prime Minister Silvio Berlusconi, Mr Bush said: "There may be some possible link" between Osama bin Laden and a recent flurry of anthrax-related developments. AP