The Taleban, who controlled most of Afghanistan at the beginning of last week, were clinging to two remaining strongholds last night - Kandahar in the south and Kunduz in the north.
In both cities there were signs that they were prepared to fight to the bitter end.
Taleban spokesman Tayeb al-Agha dismissed reports at the weekend that the regime's leader, Mullah Mohammed Omar, was preparing to abandon Kandahar.
Speaking to al-Jazeera television, he said the reports, by the Pakistan-based Afghan Islamic Press news agency, were lies.
"The Prince of the Believers, Mullah Omar, and all the senior Taleban officials are in Kandahar and the provinces around it which are under our control. They have not left," he said.
"We have thousands of troops in Kandahar and in the provinces around it and we have decided to fight to retain control of them to maintain Islamic rule."
The defiance came at the end of a week when the Taleban, the main protector of suspected terrorism mastermind Osama bin Laden, were sent packing from the capital, Kabul amid a storm of US air strikes and a lightning advance by the opposition Northern Alliance.
Their hold on the country has shrunk from more than 90 per cent to about a third.
Aside from Kandahar, the only major Taleban bastion left is the northern province and city of Kunduz.
The Northern Alliance said they had the city surrounded, but thousands of Pakistani, Arab and Chechen Taleban fighters defied an ultimatum to surrender by Saturday.
"The mayor of Kunduz is negotiating with local Taleban and they say we will give up the city for you. But the foreign Taleban will never accept this," said an Alliance spokesman.
Fears of a bloodbath have arisen from reports that foreign Taleban fighters in the province feel they have nothing to lose, because of Northern Alliance threats to kill all of them.
"There are more than 30,000 Taleban in Kunduz, but I think less than 10,000 are foreigners - Arabs, Pakistanis, Chechens, Uzbeks and Bangladeshis," said the spokesman.
The Northern Alliance, a grouping of warlords from northern Afghanistan, needs to seize Kunduz to consolidate its gains and open transport routes.
United States aircraft have over the past week repeatedly targeted Taleban positions in and around the city.
Four US bombers, including a B-52, took part in the latest raids. A massive mushroom cloud of smoke resulted from the B-52 raid, which was followed by three more bombers.
The Sunday Telegraph, meanwhile, quoted civilians it said had escaped from Kunduz as saying a non-Afghan commander of bin Laden's al Qaeda fighters had ordered the execution of 150 Afghan Taleban troops there. The executed troops had wanted to surrender.
Foreign fighters with al Qaeda and the Taleban are unpopular with many Afghans and have nowhere to flee.
They are expected to put up fierce resistance.
- REUTERS
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