November 26, 2001	Monday	Ramazan 10, 1422

KHANABAD, Nov 25: Northern Alliance ethnic Uzbek warlord Abdul Rashid Dostam’s forces are three kilometres outside the northern Afghan city of Kunduz, a Tajik commander said on Sunday.

Commander Mohammad Daoud told reporters that he had been appointed governor of Kunduz and Dostam had stopped his advance to allow the ethnic Tajik forces the honour of entering the city first.

“Dostam’s troops have stopped around three kilometres from Kunduz to the west,” he told reporters hours after his soldiers drove the last vestiges of Taliban resistance out of Khanabad, to the east of Kunduz.

“Following a meeting of the military chiefs of the northern provinces, I have been designated the future governor of Kunduz and I must be the first to enter the city.”

The Pakistan-based Afghan Islamic Press agency earlier reported that Dostam’s troops had entered Kunduz overnight Saturday and Sunday morning.

It said some 2,500 soldiers loyal to Dostam had taken control of 70 per cent of the city and were dismantling the Taliban’s defences under a handover agreed with the Taliban commanders.

The Northern Alliance is a loose grouping of ethnic minority factions which are often at odds with one another and compete for territory and influence.

Dostam was the first Northern Alliance commander to enter the Balkh provincial capital Mazar-i-Sharif on November 9, precipitating the collapse of the hardline Taliban regime.

He has since stretched his influence to neighbouring Samangan, Sar-e-Pul and Jawzjan provinces, as well as Kunduz in the northeast and Faryab in the northwest.

Around 2,000 Taliban troops have surrendered to the alliance from Kunduz in recent days but it is unclear if any remain in the city. Earlier estimates put the number of Taliban there at up to 9,000.

The fall of Kunduz marks the loss of the Taliban’s last stronghold in northern Afghanistan. The Islamic militia now controls only four provinces in the far south, around their ethnic Pashtun heartland of Kandahar.—AFP