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Afghan Alliance Vows to Put Bin Laden, Mullah Omar on Trial
ABU DHABI, Nov. 14 (IslamOnline & News Agencies) - Alleged terrorist mastermind Osama bin Laden and Taliban leader Mullah Mohammad Omar will be put on trial if they are captured, Afghan opposition Northern Alliance Foreign Minister Abdullah Abdullah told news agencies Wednesday.
"We consider them as war criminals, and they must be brought to court and tried," Abdullah said in an interview Wednesday from Kabul with Abu Dhabi satellite television. "They both have committed many crimes against the Afghan people and massacred innocent civilians in Afghanistan."
The Northern Alliance foreign minister added that he had also seen "innocent civilians gathered in tents against the biting cold, and all that is called terror."
The minister went on to say "the United Nations has a crucial role to play in the framework of negotiations and the process of reconstructing the country," Agence France-Press (AFP) reported.
"The United Nations will have to play the most important role to restore peace in the country and to guarantee, as an observer, the staffing of general elections in Afghanistan."
But he added that following "the defeat of the Taliban and terrorists, there will no more war and, consequently, there will be no need of an international peace force."
The U.N. on Tuesday spelled out a five-point political plan for Afghanistan and urged donors to support the country's reconstruction.
Lakhdar Brahimi, Secretary General Kofi Annan's special representative on Afghanistan, told the Security Council a senior U.N. official is due to go to Kabul "immediately [after] security conditions permit".
Brahimi said U.N. staff that left Afghanistan before the United States launched its air war against the ruling Taliban on October 7 would start returning soon, but he advised against sending U.N. peacekeepers.
In Kabul, the Alliance invited "all Afghan groups at this stage to come to Kabul and to start negotiations about the future of Afghanistan" and added that the U.N.'s presence was necessary.
The Security Council is to meet on Wednesday to discuss a blueprint for a post-Taliban government in Afghanistan.
Frantic diplomatic efforts to create a broad-based government began Tuesday after the opposition Northern Alliance swept into the capital Kabul following retreating Taliban forces.
There is already widespread support from the Security Council and six countries bordering Afghanistan for a draft resolution outlining a transitional administration, the BBC added.
The urgency of international diplomacy has been heightened with the expected arrival in Kabul Wednesday of Rabbani.
The need for a quick decision has also been underlined by the continuing fluid situation on the ground, as opposition forces claim to have reduced Taleban-held territory to less than 20% of the country.
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