KABUL, April 9: In a bid to restore uneasy control over a northern province overrun by a powerful warlord, Afghanistan's government ordered armed groups quit the area, as the governor said on Friday he was preparing to flee.

The stand-down command issued on Thursday by the country's National Security Council, came after troops loyal to feared Uzbek strongman Abdul Rashid Dostam - who dominates northern Afghanistan - overran the remote province of Faryab.

"All those armed groups who have entered Faryab province and the city of Meymanah from the neighbouring provinces and districts are hereby ordered to return to their original locations immediately," the council said.

"The governor of Faryab and other officials are advised to continue their work." But the order from Kabul, struggling to exert authority over unruly regional militias, came too late for Faryab's desperate governor, Anayatullah Anayat, who said he was ready to flee to nearby Turkmenistan to escape Dostam's men.

"I hope Turkmenistan will give me political asylum," Anayatullah Anayat told AFP via telephone from an undisclosed hiding place in the northern province. The Kabul-appointed governor said soldiers loyal to Dostam had "flooded into Faryab" from the surrounding regions of Sheberghan, Sari Pul and Samangan over the past few days.

"It was a well-organized military movement to Faryab. They attacked my house first with stones and later with hand grenades and bullets. I had to leave my house," he said. "Some 2,000 militiamen have flooded into the province so we could not resist. I left the capital (Meymanah) with the intelligence director, police chief, mayor and 25 other government officers."

Anayat said Turkmenistan offered his only hope of escape as Dostam's forces had surrounded him. But he added that he was only seeking temporary refuge. "We are in a safe and undisclosed location... and we are waiting for some orders from the central government. We hope to take the city back with the support of the national troops," Anayat said. "We hope to release the city from the illegal militia forces."

Skirmishes between Dostam and government-appointed military commander General Hashim Habibi erupted in Faryab on Tuesday night after Habibi decided to switch allegiance from the Uzbek general to Kabul, Anayat told AFP earlier.

The incident is the latest to underscore President Hamid Karzai's struggle to extend his government's mandate into provinces where warlords such as Dostam traditionally hold sway, largely through loyal militias.

Efforts to bring Dostam into the central government fold, including a brief stint as a deputy defence minister, and an ongoing appointment as Karzai's special advisor on northern Afghanistan, seem to have come unstuck.

"These events are a clear indication that peace and security of the people of Afghanistan can not be ensured so long as warlords and armed militias exist in the country," the National Security Council statement said. -AFP