M A I N   N E W S

USA not to allow militant outfits in Pakistan

New Delhi, September 28
The USA tonight said militant outfits in Pakistan or anywhere else in the world would not be allowed to continue their terrorist operations against innocent people.

“There are no good or bad terrorists. Terrorists are terrorists,” US Ambassador to India Robert Blackwill told a TV channel in an interview.

He said: “The days are gone when a movement can justify killing of innocent people in the name of a freedom struggle.” The international community has firmly resolved to fight international terrorism, he said.

Meanwhile, President George W. Bush ruled out negotiations with Afghanistan’s Taliban leaders, demanding anew they turned over Bin Laden and his followers and destroy their “terrorist camps.”

Courting Islamic support for his “war on terrorism” during a meeting with Jordan’s King Abdullah, the first Arab Head of State to visit the White House since the September 11 attacks, he said Bin Laden and his Al Qaeda organisation “don’t represent islam ... they represent evil.”

“There is no negotiation with the Taliban,” Mr Bush told reporters before talks with King Abdullah.

“It’s not just Mr Bin Laden that we expect to see and brought to justice,” Mr Bush added. “It’s everybody associated with his organisation that’s in Afghanistan and not only those directly associated with Mr Bin Laden, but any terrorist that’s housed and fed in Afghanistan needs to be handed over.

In Islamabad a team of revered Pakistani religious scholars and the country’s chief spymaster returned home today after a visit to Aghanistan to try to convince the ruling Taliban to hand over Osama bin Laden.

A team of Pakistani clerics from the Deobandi school of Islam spent the day issuing a warning to the Afghan leadership in their southern stronghold, Kandahar, of the danger they face from US attacks. UNI

US plane lands in Delhi
Girija Shankar Kaura
Tribune News Service

Defence officials earlier this week had said that the USA would not be provided with any landing facilities. The government would take the Opposition and the nation into confidence before providing these facilities.

ISI chief in Pak team to Kabul
OIC to discuss crisis on October 9

Islamabad, September 28
Pakistan’s ISI chief Lt-Gen Mehmud Ahmad is accompanying a delegation of Islamic clerics and officials to Kandahar today, with a mandate to prevail upon the ruling militia to respond to the demand to hand over Osama bin Laden to stand trial for the September 11 terrorist attacks in the USA.

Confirming the inclusion of the Chief of the ISI in the delegation, Pakistan Foreign Office spokesman Riaz Mohammad Khan told newspersons here that the delegation has met Taliban supreme leader Mullah Mohammad Omar but the details of the discussions were not known.

About the mandate of the delegation, Mr Khan said: “We do not define the mandate. Of course, the DG ISI is accompanying them. He headed the first delegation. The mandate was to impress upon the Afghan leadership the gravity of the situation and what the international community expected of them”.

Ahmad had led a high-level delegation to Kandahar two weeks ago and returned after a three-day stay.

Following his visit, the Taliban chief called a meeting of “Shoora” — a gathering of Islamic clerics, which asked Bin Laden to voluntarily leave the country. The decision was subsequently endorsed by the Omar himself.

But Taliban later said it could not trace Bin Laden to formally hand him the message. Last night, however, Taliban’s Ambassador to Pakistan, Mullah Abdul Saleem Zaeef, announced that Bin Laden had been traced and the message handed over to him. The spokesman denied information on the US special forces in Afghanistan.

He said Pakistan was not aware of the Taliban invitation to Mr Jackson to visit Kabul. The country would not stop any one who wanted to meet the Taliban, he added.

Pakistan would participate in the OIC meeting in Doha-Qatar on October 9 and all aspects of the present situation, including the stand taken by the Afghan leaders would be discussed, he said. The meeting has been called in the wake of the September 11 attacks in Washington and New York.

Member-nations of the Organisation of the Islamic Conference (OIC) will meet in Qatar on October 9 to discuss the crisis over feared US attacks on Afghanistan, Pakistan announced today.

Foreign Ministry spokesman Riaz Mohammad Khan said the meeting in the Gulf state’s capital Doha had been called to “address the current situation”. Foreign Minister Abdul Sattar would represent Pakistan, he added. PTI, UNI

Laden planning more attacks: UK minister

London, September 28
A British minister has said that Osama bin Laden, the prime suspect as mastermind for the September 11 attacks on Washington and New York, was planning further major attacks in the next few weeks.

“I understand that he is preparing already for high-impact terrorist attacks in the coming weeks if he’s able to,’’ Peter Hain, Minister for Europe, said on BBC TV’s Question Time programme last evening.

“There is evidence he is planning high-impact attacks in the world and we have got to make sure he doesn’t do it again.’’

Hain did not say what the targets were or what evidence he had.

Both Britain and the USA have said they believe Saudi-born Bin Laden and the Al Qaeda organisation which he controls were responsible for the suicide hijack attacks on the World Trade Center and the Pentagon which killed thousands.

A senior official for the ruling Taliban in Afghanistan, where Bin Laden is believed to be in hiding, yesterday said an edict had been delivered to him asking him to leave the country voluntarily. Reuters