December 11, 2001	Tuesday	Ramazan 25, 1422

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WASHINGTON, Dec 10: The Pentagon was refusing to confirm on Monday morning reports from Afghanistan that Al Qaeda fighters had been forced from the Tora Bora cave complex and had taken shelter in a nearby gorge or valley.

But the Pentagon admitted that it had dropped a 15,000-lb bomb known as the daisycutter on the cave complex, where the Al Qaeda leadership was said to be located.

The powerful bomb is designed to kill everything within a range of 600 yards.

There is still no word here about the whereabouts of Osama bin Laden and Taliban leader Mulla Omar. But US forces have stepped up their surveillance, including along Afghanistan’s borders with Pakistan, and marine interdiction is also being carried out of shipping in the Arabian Sea and the Gulf.

Deputy Defence Secretary Paul Wolfowitz appeared at the daily Pentagon briefing on Monday and cautioned Americans against believing that the war in Afghanistan had been won because the Taliban regime had collapsed.

He said the search for Al Qaeda and Taliban leaders could still be continuing months from now.

In fact, Mr Wolfowitz pointed out, the US-led campaign could be entering a more difficult phase in that when the Taliban regime was in power, there was a commonality of interest among the coalition and the Afghan groups, but now the latter could pursue their own local objectives.

There was persistent questioning of Mr Wolfowitz and Pentagon spokesman Rear Admiral John Stufflebeem of the results of the search for Osama bin Laden and Mulla Omar, and it was clear from their answers that the US does not yet have reliable intelligence about the Al Qaeda and Taliban leaders or of the actual situation at Tora Bora, which is close to the border with Pakistan.

The Northern Alliance said Al Qaeda fighters had retreated from the cave complex, but military observers here doubted the assertion and said at most it appeared that the alliance was in command of the high ground overlooking the complex.

A couple of “important” Al Qaeda leaders have apparently been captured, but the top men seem to be at large. Mr Wolfowitz said some people linked to Al Qaeda had been arrested in Pakistan, with some of the arrests having been made before the bombing campaign began.

Several hundreds of suspects have also been rounded up in the 60 countries where the US believes there is an Al Qaeda presence.

On the question of widening the war, Mr Wolfowitz, while repeating the well-known US position on Iraq’s acquisition of weapons of mass destruction and Baghdad’s refusal over the past three years to allow entry to United Nations weapons inspectors, repeatedly said the focus should remain on Afghanistan till Al Qaeda and the Taliban had been rooted out.

Also on Monday, it was reported that US Marines had moved into Kabul to secure the American embassy compound there.

This is the first time that a US presence has been reported in the Afghan capital since the campaign began and indeed in the past 12 years. Probing missions were also reported from Camp Rhino, set up near Kandahar.

OSAMA VIDEOTAPE: US President George W. Bush may release a video found in Afghanistan that officials here say leaves no doubt that Osama bin Laden was behind Sept 11 terror strikes, the White House said Monday, adds AFP.

The tape reportedly shows Osama saying he was happily surprised by the extent of the damage at the World Trade Centre — destroyed when two hijacked passenger planes slammed into the twin towers — and using words that show he knew of the attack before it happened.

Bush spokesman Ari Fleischer told reporters that the National Security Council was wrestling with the matter.

The president himself is torn between the belief that it is “important for people to know what

Osama bin Laden has said in that regard” and concerns about giving the Saudi-born militant more publicity, said Fleischer.

Another concern echoes administration worries about past videotapes showing Osama or members of his Al Qaeda network, namely that the recordings may be used to convey coded messages meant to activate terrorist “sleeper cells.”

But this tape “doesn’t appear to be pre-packaged propaganda it appears to be a conversation that was taped as he was talking to other people,” said Fleischer, who told reporters that Bush has seen the tape and read a transcript.

The United States officials at first feared that the videotape — discovered during the search of a home in Jalalabad, Afghanistan — was fake, but after showing it to outside experts they are comfortable with its authenticity, the Washington Post reported.