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Kandahar Tense as Tribal Council Fails to End Power Struggle
KABUL, Dec 8. (IslamOnline & News Agencies) - Kandahar was a tinderbox of tribal tension Saturday as squabbling clansmen trying to carve personal fiefdoms out of its ruins failed to agree on who should govern the southern Afghan city, sources said.
Meetings of Pashtun tribal leaders were underway to end the chaos that has gripped the city since the Taliban's withdrawal Friday but no consensus was in sight, the Afghan Islamic Press (AIP) reported.
Quoting local residents, the Pakistan-based AIP said most of the city was in the control of Mullah Naqibullah, the former Kandahar corps commander who surrendered to the Taliban in 1994.
But spokesmen for Pashtun tribal chief and former provincial governor Gul Agha said their leader had taken control of the Governor House and had surrounded Naqibullah's men in a military compound.
Agha's spokesman, Jalal Khan, told Agence France-Presse (AFP) by telephone from the governor's mansion that Naqibullah had been given an ultimatum to give up or face the consequences.
"We have sent neutral people to Mullah Naqib who is at the main military headquarters in Kandahar," said Khan. "We need a response from him, yes or no. Give up or be ready for fighting."
Five people reportedly died in sporadic clashes between the two militia forces on Friday, while Agha's spokesmen said Arab forces loyal to Osama bin Laden were hiding near the airport.
A Taliban fighter reaching the Pakistan border town of Chaman said armed Taliban were still roaming the streets despite their leader Mullah Mohammad Omar's decision to hand over power to Naqibullah.
Under the terms of the surrender negotiated with interim Afghan leader-in-waiting Hamid Karzai, Naqibullah would become Kandahar governor and ordinary Taliban soldiers would be allowed to go free.
"There are still Arab Taliban moving around the city. They are armed," said Taliban fighter Hafiz Abdul Rub, who arrived at the Pakistani border after traveling from Kandahar Saturday, AFP reported. "No one is in control of the city. Mullah Naqib should be in control but no one is."
Agha's forces fought their way to the edge of Kandahar before the Taliban agreed to surrender Thursday to Karzai, another Pashtun leader who has been selected to lead a U.N.-backed interim cabinet in Afghanistan.
Agha is furious that he was not consulted on the terms of the surrender and that the governorship had been awarded to Naqibullah and other commanders who had not sent their forces to fight the Taliban.
Naqibullah, a Taliban sympathizer, was accused of allowing former Taliban officials into the leadership council, which was supposed to rule the city.
"We seized the city by force and in the process lost five people," Gul Agha's spokesman and cousin, Akbar Jan, said in Quetta, Pakistan, near the frontier with Afghanistan.
"Mullah Naqibullah and his supporters are confined in the main military base, which is under our siege," Jan said. "We have sent a neutral man to convince Mullah Naqibullah to vacate the base without bloodshed. We have not vacated the airport but around 200 Arabs are believed to be hiding in the area."
Khan said Agha was preparing to move out of Kandahar to take over neighboring provinces Helmand, Uruzgan and Zabul, as well as Herat and Farah in the west.
Herat and Farah are currently under the control of ethnic Tajik commander Ismail Khan, a senior member of the U.S-backed Northern Alliance forces, which captured Kabul early last month as the Taliban withdrew.
"We now will move to Helmand, Uruzgan, Herat, Zabul and Farah. I will send my men or lead myself if need be. I will give them plans and a movement order," Jalal Khan said.
Meanwhile, it remains unclear whether Mullah Omar "definitely" left Kandahar following the militia's surrender of its former bastion, as a Taliban official in Pakistan claimed to AFP Saturday.
"I can confirm it to you that he is no longer in Kandahar. He is out of Kandahar," said the official on the condition of anonymity.
"I have checked it with my people and they have told me that he is in no one's custody. He is not in Kandahar. Beyond this I do not know his whereabouts."
The official's claims could not be independently confirmed but there has been no sign of the reclusive Omar since the Taliban agreed Thursday to hand over power in Kandahar to local Pashtun tribal leaders.
The official said Omar had not personally taken part in negotiations with Karzai that had led to the surrender deal - under which the Taliban agreed to be disarmed in return for a general amnesty - which did not extend to Omar.
"Mullah Omar had given authority to his cabinet ministers to find a solution but he did not himself participate in the talks," he said, AFP reported. "But the decision was made after he gave powers to his ministers."
He denied claims that Naqibullah was holding Omar.
"He is not in anyone's custody, Mullah Naqibullah or anyone else. His whereabouts are not known but he is certainly not in Kandahar."
Khan, also said earlier Saturday that he believed Omar was still in Kandahar and may be with interim Karzai or with Naqibullah.
Agha's tribal forces had launched an intensive search in Kandahar for Omar, wanted by the United States for "harboring terrorists", he said.
"Mullah Mohammad Omar is a criminal and the main culprit," Khan said. "Whether he is with Hamid Karzai or Mullah Naqibullah, our men are chasing him and they will track him down along with his close aides," he said.
Khan said Naqibullah was under siege at the main military base in Kandahar.
Bin Laden's whereabouts remain unknown, but it is believed he is hiding out in Tora Bora.
The Pentagon Saturday confirmed that forces had found one of his camps but that he was nowhere to be found.
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