WASHINGTON/KABUL - American warplanes launched their most sustained attack yet on Taleban front lines north of Kabul on Saturday as, at home, the US strove to nail down the mystery extremists responsible for a wave of anthrax biological warfare attacks that have spooked the nation.
The US government has acted on the home front with new anti-terrorist legislation and the stockpiling of medicine to fight germ warfare while the hunt for those using the postal system to deliver anthrax gathered pace in America and abroad.
Playing down a report in the Washington Post that FBI and CIA investigators believe extremists in the United States, not connected to Osama bin Laden, are probably behind anthrax cases in Florida, New York and Washington, a US intelligence official said "no definitive conclusion has been reached."
"I don't think we've ruled anything out at this point," the official told Reuters, leaving open the possibility that bin Laden and his al Qaeda network blamed by Washington for September 11 attacks on America which killed nearly 5,000 people had launched a second attack using anthrax-laced letters.
The White House, punishing Afghanistan's Taleban for harbouring Saudi-born militant bin Laden, saw its plans to replace the Islamic rulers with an alternative government dealt a blow on Friday when their fighters captured and executed opposition commander Abdul Haq.
A planned meeting of Afghan opposition groups to be held in Ankara this weekend was delayed amid turmoil sparked by Haq's killing. His grieving relatives expected his remains to be returned to the Pakistan border city of Peshawar on Saturday.
The US military campaign, however, was bolstered by news that Russia intended to give 40 tanks and 100 armoured vehicles to the opposition Northern Alliance and by Britain's commitment of ground forces in the form of 200 Royal Marines from "3 Commando Brigade," experts in mountain warfare.
On the diplomatic front, Saudi Arabia, Washington's main regional ally but which has tried to distance itself from the Afghan campaign, said the Taleban was mostly to blame for the crisis in Afghanistan.
"There is no doubt that the leadership in Afghanistan bears the largest part of responsibility," Saudi Foreign Minister Prince Saud al-Faisal said in Riyadh.
British Prime Minister Tony Blair, who has been a key figure in stiffening the resolve of countries backing President Bush's war on terrorism, is to visit Saudi Arabia on Wednesday for talks, Saudi sources said on Saturday.
In another move to bring Saudi Arabia closer into the loop, General Tommy Franks, head of the US military's Central Command, met on Saturday with Saudi King Fahd.
In Afghanistan, US bombers hammered Kabul on Saturday, lighting up the night sky with fireballs, and unleashed their heaviest raids yet on Taleban front lines north of the city.
"It was one of the worst nights," said one Kabul resident, speaking on the 21st day of the US assault on Afghanistan.
Smoke billowed from a compound of the International Committee of the Red Cross, whose warehouses were hit by US jets a day earlier. The ICRC said on Saturday it was unable to distribute food to Kabul residents because of the bombing.
North of the city, US warplanes circled high above Taleban air defences and dived to release bombs and missiles on Taleban trenches and gun emplacements facing Northern Alliance forces. "This is the heaviest day of air attacks on this front so far," said opposition commander Mustafa.
A Taleban official said on Saturday the hunt was on for a man believed to be an American who was traveling with Haq.
"He was spotted with Abdul Haq and as far as we know his name is Jamber Jihi," Information Ministry spokesman Abdul Hanan Himat told Reuters. "We are searching for him."
The United States sent an unmanned, armed Predator spy plane to try to save the veteran Pashtun warlord, who lost a foot fighting the Soviet occupation in the 1980s. But he was seized while trying to flee on horseback.
His death, which undermined US efforts to forge a broad opposition alliance around deposed King Zahir Shah, was "a big fiasco for America's plans in Afghanistan," Himat said.
Pakistan's military ruler General Pervez Musharraf played down Haq's importance in the forging of any future government. "He didn't have much role to play," he said.
The leader of a pro-royal Afghan opposition group said Haq's execution was a setback, but showed the desperation of the hard-line rulers and would not stop efforts to win over more moderate Taleban figures.
"If even a solo act by Commander Haq draws such a response ... it means that the Taleban are scared. Even an individual cannot be tolerated. It shows their desperation," said Sayed Ahmad Gailani, leader of the Assembly for Peace and National Unity of Afghanistan.
In other military developments, about 4,500 armed Pakistani tribesmen set out to cross into Afghanistan on Saturday to help the Taleban.
And opposition warlord General Abdul Rashid Dostum said on Saturday he had scored successes in three days of fighting the Taleban near the strategic northern city of Mazar-i-Sharif.
"We have killed 80 Taleban soldiers and taken 20 prisoners. including a Pakistani commander," Dostum said. His forces had destroyed 18 Taleban armoured vehicles, including tanks, the ethnic Uzbek commander said.
In the United States, Bush, rushing to contain the anthrax scare and facing up to the possibility of further attacks by bin Laden, thanked Congress on Saturday for approving new sweeping anti-terrorism laws.
"(The laws) reflect a firm resolve...while dealing swiftly and severely with terrorists," Bush said in a radio address.
It was anthrax that was uppermost in Americans' minds.
In a spate of cases which have stretched from New York to Miami involving letters laced with anthrax spores, three people have died, at least 11 others have been infected and thousands more have been tested or given medicine for the rare disease.
The attacks have worried Americans, on edge after the plane attacks that shattered the nation's sense of security.
Investigators have no clear suspects and are not sure if there are other undetected letters that contain the potentially deadly microbe.
So far, federal authorities have identified only one letter in the Washington area that contained anthrax -- sent to Senate Majority Leader Tom Daschle, a South Dakota Democrat.
Detection of anthrax at a growing number of government mail facilities and congressional offices has raised the possibility that one or more additional anthrax letters may have come through the Washington area.
In the latest case, a third US postal facility in New Jersey was closed on Saturday after investigators found evidence of anthrax contamination on a mail bin.
Americans were not as confident in the administration's ability to deal with terrorism within the United States than they were with Washington's strategy to fight overseas, according to a new survey released on Saturday.
Only 48 per cent of those polled for Newsweek magazine by Princeton Survey Research Associates felt the administration had a well-thought-out plan for fighting bioterrorism at home, while 43 per cent said they believed it did not. This contrasted with 88 per cent approving of US military action.
About 300 anti-war protesters staged a demonstration in downtown Washington carrying placards that read "Stop Bombing Afghanistan" and "Stop Bush's War."
With international tensions high over the military campaign in Afghanistan, Iraq's Foreign Minister Naji Sabri urged the world's largest Muslim body -- the Organisation of Islamic Conference -- to condemn the United States.
The bombing has caused a refugee crisis, and Musharraf said on Saturday another 2 million Afghan refugees would pour across the frontier if his country does as the United Nations wants and opens its borders.
United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees Ruud Lubbers arrived in Pakistan on Saturday and said he expected Islamabad to be more flexible about allowing in the refugees.
The White House is expected as early as next week to announce an additional $500 million in aid for Pakistan, sources said on Saturday. The money would be part of a package expected to include debt rescheduling, trade concessions and Washington's support for international loans.
The Taleban said on Saturday that an investigation into detained French journalist Michel Peyrard was nearly over and findings would be presented in court soon. Peyrard was accused of spying, an offence that carries the death penalty.
- REUTERS
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Timeline: Major events since the Sept 11 attacks
US blitzes Taleban, agonises over anthrax
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