KABUL - United States troops captured two al Qaeda members near a huge cave complex in eastern Afghanistan and scooped up valuable intelligence to help them in their hunt for Osama bin Laden and Taleban chief Mullah Mohammad Omar.
The surrender of three former Taleban ministers, whom Washington also wants to question, may offer further clues.
On the diplomatic front, the focus turned to the reconstruction of the devastated country with meetings on needs and funding planned in the capital Kabul next week and in Japan on January 21.
"We anticipate that identifying the resources needed for Afghan reconstruction will be one important focus of the Tokyo meeting," a US official said, adding that Secretary of State Colin Powell would attend the two-day Japan conference.
The Pentagon's top military officer said a US team in the Khost area yesterday found a group of 14 fighters belonging to bin Laden's al Qaeda network. They took two into custody and seized computers, cellphones and other intelligence material.
The two were singled out because they were "senior enough where they might have the kind of information that we're looking for in terms of operational methodology, future operations and so forth", Air Force General Richard Myers said.
The other members of the group, captured close to the extensive Zhawar Kili caves, were in Afghan custody.
Myers, chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, said US forces were still searching the caves after jets bombed the area on Tuesday.
The US now has between 3500 and 4000 troops in Afghanistan to press the hunt for bin Laden and Omar. US military officials were hoping to gather fresh clues on their location from the former Taleban ministers of defence, justice and mines and industry who have surrendered to authorities in the militia's former stronghold of Kandahar.
The ministers were later released but are not allowed to move about freely. A senior US military official said he expected them to be handed over to the US.
The number of Taleban and al Qaeda detainees held by US forces in and near Afghanistan rose to 364. They plan to start transferring them soon to a US base at Guantanamo Bay, Cuba.
Interrogation of detainees had produced valuable information. "We think we have thwarted some attacks," said Myers, but he declined to give details.
American soldiers are questioning al Qaeda and Taleban prisoners in Pakistan to identify those with enough knowledge of al Qaeda to merit being moved to US custody.
General Tommy Franks, commander of US and allied forces in the Afghanistan area, said Pakistan has agreed to allow American forces to pursue al Qaeda or Taleban fugitives into the country from Afghanistan.
US aircraft dropped pamphlets over eastern Afghanistan yesterday warning people not to shelter Taleban and al Qaeda fighters, or risk being bombed, the Pakistan-based news agency Afghan Islamic Press said.
The first 70 German troops to join the British-led international security force for Afghanistan left for Kabul yesterday.
The force is expected to total fewer than 5000 foreign soldiers, although Prime Minister-designate Hamid Karzai has said he might ask for more.
The newly deployed peacekeeping force has been fired on for the first time. Just hours before British Prime Minister Tony Blair and and a party of nine US senators arrived at Bagram airbase on Tuesday, a tracer bullet was reportedly fired at a French convoy travelling there from the capital.
No one was injured in the attack but it underlined the volatility of the situation.
The January 21 conference in Tokyo will look at ways of finding the billions of dollars needed to rebuild a country shattered by two decades of conflict.
Ahead of that meeting, envoys from Russia, the US and Afghanistan's six neighbours will review the requirements next week in Kabul.
- REUTERS, - INDEPENDENT
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