Bid to crush last northern bastion

Northern Alliance forces are preparing a final assault on Kunduz, last bastion of the Taliban in northern Afghanistan.

The city has been defended by fighters of al Qaeda. With them are Uzbek fundamentalists allied to al Qaeda and Muslim militants of the Uighur minority from western China.

The Northern Alliance commander Mohammad Qassim Fahim Khan, now in charge of security in Kabul, ordered a column of tanks and armoured personnel carriers to attack the northern pocket if the Taliban refused to surrender.

Chinese and Uzbek leaders of the resistance were reported to have been flown out of the Kunduz pocket yesterday, for an unknown destination.

Fighters from the Uzbek Islamic Movement, created by al Qaeda, have been active on the roads into Afghanistan from Uzbekistan and Tajikistan. They still present a serious threat of ambush for aid convoys heading south. Leading charities under the World Food Programme say they will not send convoys as long as there are bands of Uzbek, Arab, Chechen and Chinese fighters in the area.

While the Northern Alliance may be calling on the Taliban forces in the north to surrender, local commanders have told their men to kill any foreigners found among the defenders.