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Taliban Have Bin Laden
ISLAMABAD, Sept 30 (News Agencies) - Afghanistan's ruling Taliban acknowledged Sunday that the U.S.'s most wanted man, Saudi dissident Osama bin Laden, was under their protection and being kept at a secret location for his own safety.
"Osama bin Laden is under the control of the Islamic Emirate of Afghanistan and only security people know where he is," Taliban ambassador to Pakistan Abdul Salam Zaeef told reporters.
"He is in Afghanistan in an unknown place for his safety and security," Zaeef said. "I want to state categorically that Osama bin Laden will not be handed to anyone."
Despite his comments, the Taliban has repeatedly said it is willing to negotiate with the United States if it is provided with solid evidence of bin Laden's involvement in attacks against American targets.
One week ago, the Taliban had insisted that bin Laden - accused of masterminding the hijackings in the United States on September 11th - had disappeared and could not be contacted.
Zaeef's statement came amid persistent reports that U.S., British and perhaps Australian commandos were already operating in Afghanistan ahead of possible U.S.-led attacks against bin Laden and the Taliban.
Bin Laden has lived in Afghanistan since 1996 as a "guest" of the Taliban, which rules most of the country except for pockets under the control of ethnic-based opposition forces.
In a statement carried by Taliban-run Radio Shariat, the militia's reclusive leader Mullah Mohammad Omar appeared to finally slam the door on the prospect of any compromise, and vowed to fight a long war if his regime was toppled.
"Do you not feel ashamed at coming back with the support of the Americans?" Omar said in comments directed at the 86-year-old former king, Mohammed Zahir Shah, who has been living in exile in Rome since his ouster in 1973.
Zahir Shah was Sunday locked in discussions with U.S. congressmen over forming a new broad-based government with anti-Taliban factions, amid growing signs that the U.S.-led war on terrorism was also seeking to oust the Taliban from power.
But Omar warned the former king: "Don't you know the nature of Afghans that they will fight against your corrupt administration?"
He then delivered a chilling warning to Afghans collaborating with anti-Taliban elements: "Afghans should not fulfill the interests of the United States. If you pay no attention to Islam and God's law, then your death will be allowed."
The one-eyed hardliner also took aim at the U.S.
"Leave the Afghans, Muslims and Arab countries alone ... and then you will be safe," Omar said. "If not, you will not be safe for all your life.
"The [Taliban] government may collapse, but it will be the same as during the time of the
jihad [struggle against the Soviet Union]. New fronts will be established, just like against the communists," he warned.
"You may capture the airports and the capital and the cities, but people will go to the mountains," Omar added.
"God willing, I believe that neither the U.S. or their allies will be able to do anything. They will only find the same destiny as the communists."
Despite the Taliban's continued defiance, there were growing signs of panic within its ranks.
Opposition forces grouped under the Northern Alliance claimed some 200 Taliban soldiers had switched sides after overnight fighting in the west and east, in which the militia lost control of a remote district.
Pakistani military sources said there were signs that thousands of Arab Islamists - loyal bin Laden followers or volunteers who come to Afghanistan to help the Taliban create its idea of a pure Islamic state - had been deployed to the militia's southern stronghold of Kandahar.
In the capital Kabul, lawlessness and crime appeared to be on the rise as Taliban forces left for the frontlines, with witness accounts of two raids on aid agencies by groups of armed men trying to steal pickup trucks.
And on the Pakistani border opposite the Khyber Pass, independent sources said the Taliban was forcibly conscripting fleeing refugees in eastern Afghanistan to bolster their frontline positions.
"Refugees are being stopped at Taliban checkposts and the men are being separated from the women and children. They are being sent to the frontlines and the women and children are making it across the border," a western aid source told Agence France-Presse (AFP).
The first humanitarian aid to enter Afghanistan in three weeks rolled across the Pakistan border Sunday, bringing 400 tons of wheat and some hope for the eight million displaced Afghans that the United Nations estimates are in need of emergency assistance.
U.N. special envoy to Afghanistan Francesc Vendrell told AFP the Taliban was running out of time if it wanted to survive on the Afghan political landscape.
He said elements in the Taliban should "lift their heads" and realize that they could not continue to ignore the will of the international community.
"Their behavior in the coming weeks will say something as to whether they are acceptable for the future," he said.
The Pakistan-based Afghan Islamic Press reported that the Taliban had arrested six people in Afghanistan for distributing anti-Taliban pamphlets supporting the former king.
Taliban Chief Justice Noor Mohammad Saqib, considered a hardliner in the militia's secretive hierarchy, accused the United States of double standards Sunday as he promised a fair trial for eight Western aid workers charged with preaching Christianity in Afghanistan.
"The United States, without any proof or evidence, has been threatening Afghanistan and its guest [bin Laden]," Saqib told the Westerners - two Americans, two Australians and four Germans - during only their second appearance in court since the trial began last month.
"The present situation will have no impact on the court. This will be a fair trial."
Washington has also demanded the release of the aid workers - who were arrested along with 16 Afghan colleagues in early August.
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