ROME, Nov 16: Afghanistan’s former king Mohammed Zahir Shah intends to return soon to Kabul retaken from the Taliban regime this week in a reversal of fortunes, a spokesman said on Friday.

The spokesman, Hamid Sidiq, said that the elderly exiled monarch would visit Kabul when the security conditions allow but he did not give a date.

“It will not take that long. First we have to provide safe conditions for our countrymen,” he said.

“I said that all parts of the country are the Afghan territory. But he desires to go to the capital of Afghanistan.”

“We are waiting (for) our brothers in the Northern Alliance to tell us of their preparedness so that we can sit and form the Supreme Council for National Unity of Afghanistan,” Sidiq said.

The spokesman told AFP that the Northern Alliance, which took advantage of US air strikes to take Kabul and most of the country’s northern, central and western parts from the Taliban over the last week, had promised to host Zahir Shah.

“There were talks yesterday and they have promised cooperation,” he said.

He however urged the alliance leaders to “realize the reality and need for collective cooperation”.

Zahir Shah who has lived in Rome since he was overthrown in 1973 has been at the centre of international efforts to unify anti-Taliban groups in a transition administration.

In a Friday statement, he implicitly brushed aside indications that the recent dramatic advances by the Northern Alliance had politically out manoeuvred him.

He said that his efforts to jointly form the Supreme Council with the Northern Alliance and to call the emergency Loya Jirga, or grand assembly of local elders, were still in full swing.

Last month, both sides agreed to form the council with an equal representation of 60 nominees from each side.—AFP