PESHAWAR, Nov 23: Taliban deputy defence minister Mulla Fazal returned to Mazar-i-Sharif on Friday in an attempt to save a surrender agreement reached with Gen Rashid Dostum on Thursday from collapse as the Northern Alliance launched a three-pronged attack on Kunduz.
But, a top Northern Alliance official told Reuters in an interview in Kabul that they had suspended attacks on Kunduz to allow besieged defenders more time to agree a surrender. He warned that they would resume the assault if nothing was agreed by Saturday afternoon.
“Negotiations are going on at this stage. If this doesn’t work then there will be more fighting. But Kunduz is still under Taliban control,” Northern Alliance Foreign Minister Abdullah Abdullah said late Friday.
“We hope that negotiations will work, but if they don’t we have no choice but to go for a military option on Saturday,” he said.
Taliban officials in Kunduz said that Mulla Fazal who had come back to Kunduz to brief fellow commanders on details of his talks with Gen Dostum, rushed to Mazar-i-Sharif in an attempt to save the surrender agreement, resumes Ismail Khan.
There was still no information as to what prompted the fighting in the backdrop of negotiations to effect the surrender of a city that is under siege for the last 10 days.
However, a spokesperson for the governor of Kunduz, Mohammad Gul Zubair, charged that some unscrupulous elements within the Northern Alliance were trying to scuttle a settlement.
A report reaching here said that the Northern Alliance had attacked Kunduz from Khanabad, Bangi and Dasht-i-Arachi backed by the US bombers. Mulla Zubair said the fighting was the heaviest in over a week but there were few casualties.
A source in the Northern Alliance said that the Taliban commanders were insisting on a safe passage for the non-Afghan fighters — mostly Arabs, Chechens, Uzbeks and Pakistanis.
Gen Dostum said that he would lead over 5,000 of his troops to Kunduz on Saturday to oversee the surrender, CNN reported.
Fighters who surrendered would be taken to Mazar-i-Sharif, he said, where the Afghan fighters would be allowed to return home but the foreign fighters would be arrested and tried under the law of the Islamic State of Afghanistan.
A CNN correspondent in the area said that at least 300 Taliban fighters had already surrendered to the Northern Alliance. “It was quite a sight. These Taliban were welcomed as heroes with huge fanfare,” CNN correspondent Satinder Bindra said from the front line.
There are over 20,000 Taliban forces holding out in Kunduz while reporters from the front line put the total strength of the Northern Alliance troops at around 30,000. The exact number of the non-Afghan fighters among the Taliban is not known: the Taliban claim the figure is not more than 250. But, the Northern Alliance says the number ran into thousands.
Agencies add: A Taliban spokesman was quoted as saying “dozens of people” were killed and injured in a heavy US bombardment on the outskirts of Kunduz.
The US planes targeted Taliban front lines and civilian areas in eastern and northeastern areas of Kunduz, the spokesman told the Afghan Islamic Press agency by satellite phone from Kunduz.
“Civilians in Khanabad (east of Kunduz) area are in a bad condition due to bombardment and fighting. Children, women and men are rushing towards Kunduz,” he said.
An eyewitness near the village of Devairone, just south of Khanabad, said Alliance had launched a mortar and machinegun assault on the Taliban troops on Friday afternoon.
A Taliban spokesman, quoted by the AIP, said the militia was caught between various Northern Alliance factions.
“On the one hand we are engaged in talks with Gen Dostum, on the other, other groups in the Northern Alliance launched an offensive,” he said.
United Nations, US and British officials said they could play no role in Kunduz, but the international community urged the Northern Alliance to avoid using the capture of Kunduz for a bloody settling of scores.
KABUL: Fighting was also reported at Maidan Shahr, 20km southwest of Kabul.
In the south, Pakhtoon tribal elder Hamid Karzai said he was still hopeful the Taliban would agree to a bloodless handover of Kandahar.
Mr Karzai, an ally of former king Zahir Shah, recently returned from exile with US backing to stir up a popular revolt in the south. He said Taliban leaders were seeking head-to-head talks to resolve the standoff.
But Taliban spokesman Mullah Tayyab Agha said the talk of negotiations was “baseless”.
“We will defend Kandahar and there has been no negotiation over handing over Kandahar,” he said.
Dear visitor, the comments section is undergoing an overhaul and will return soon.