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Osama bin Laden is 'In a Secret Place'
Monday, October 01, 2001
By Laura King / The Associated Press

Afghan ambassador to Pakistan, Abdul Salam Zaeef, said the Taliban, who have rejected a series of appeals to hand over bin Laden and avert a military confrontation, were willing to talk. “We are thinking of negotiation,” he said, adding that if direct evidence against bin Laden were produced, “it might change things.”

ISLAMABAD, Pakistan -- AP
Under threat of U.S. military strikes, Afghanistan's Taliban rulers said explicitly for the first time yesterday that Osama bin Laden is still in the country, being kept in a secret location.

But the president of Pakistan, which has been appealing to the Taliban to resolve the crisis with the United States, said hopes were “very dim” that the Taliban would surrender bin Laden. Taliban supreme leader Mullah Mohammed Omar took a hard stance in a radio address yesterday, telling Afghans not to fear U.S. strikes, because “Americans don't have the courage to come here.”

Meanwhile, fierce fighting was reported in the jagged mountains of northern Afghanistan. Rebel guerrillas said they had seized a district from Taliban troops, while the Taliban said at least a dozen opposition soldiers were killed and several hurt in a blast at a base north of Kabul.
(More: Worcester Telegram & Gazette Corp. News Source)
©2001 Worcester Telegram & Gazette Corp.

Dan