Taliban foes advance on cave complex

Associated Press

TORA BORA, Afghanistan — Anti-Taliban forces battled guerrillas loyal to Osama bin Laden with tanks and mortars Wednesday, fighting their way through remote mountains toward a cave complex where they believe the terror suspect is holed up.

Up to 1,500 tribal fighters pushed down a valley in the White Mountains toward Tora Bora camp as American B-52s pounded the area with 250- and 500-pound bombs, rocking the forested mountains.

Anti-Taliban commanders said their troops advanced to within a mile of the anthill-like cave complex in eastern Afghanistan, sending the Arab, Chechen and Pakistani fighters of bin Laden’s al-Qaida network scurrying to higher ground.

At the Pentagon, spokesman Rear Adm. John Stufflebeem said said Afghan fighters had already entered some caves in the area searching for al-Qaida members.

Developments Wednesday related to the Sept. 11 terrorist attacks:

Secretary of State Colin Powell named the top U.S. envoy for Afghanistan, James Dobbins, to head a liaison office in Kabul with the new interim government.

The American Civil Liberties Union and other civil rights and human rights groups filed suit in federal court alleging that the Justice Department is violating the Constitution and federal law by withholding basic information about some 1,000 people picked up by police since Sept. 11.

An estimated 40,000 negatives of images taken by President John F. Kennedy’s personal photographer are believed to have been destroyed in a bank vault beneath the World Trade Center. Jacques Lowe, who died in May at age 71, kept his negatives in a vault at the JP Morgan Chase branch at 5 World Trade Center.