Taliban say bin Laden advised to leave Afghanistan voluntarily

By Laura King

Associated Press

ISLAMABAD, Pakistan – Afghanistan’s ruling Taliban have advised Osama bin Laden of a clerical decision urging him to leave the country voluntarily, the Afghan ambassador in Pakistan said Thursday, acknowledging that the Taliban know his location.

The Afghan ruling militia had initially asserted they could not find bin Laden to inform him of the recommendation, made Sept. 20 by a council of Muslim clerics, or the Ulema. U.S. officials had dismissed the claims that bin Laden, the top suspect in the Sept. 11 terror attacks, was missing.

Ambassador Abdul Salam Zaeef said the clerics’ decision had been “endorsed” by the Taliban’s supreme leader Mullah Mohammed Omar.

“Osama has now received the Ulema council’s recommendations and their endorsement” by Omar, he said. “We have not lost Osama, but he is out of sight of the people.”

Zaeef did not say how the message was conveyed nor where bin Laden was hiding. He also did not indicate bin Laden’s reaction to the message. It was the first time since the attacks in the United States that the Taliban have indicated clearly that they know where bin Laden is located or how to communicate with him.

The clerics did not set a deadline for bin Laden to leave when they made the recommendation during a meeting in the Afghan capital, Kabul. And the United States did not make clear if bin Laden’s leaving would avert threatened retaliation against the Taliban.

President Bush has demanded that the Taliban hand over bin Laden and his lieutenants, allow U.S. access to his camps and free detained aid workers or else face military action.

In Afghanistan’s north, Taliban troops are fighting with an opposition alliance trying to seize strategic territory. No major battles were reported Thursday, but a forward patrol of the opposition guerrillas pushed to within four miles of the capital, according to an Associated Press Television News crew traveling with the rebels.

The word on bin Laden came as the Taliban told diplomats that the trial would resume on Saturday for the eight foreign aid workers, detained since early August on charges of spreading Christianity in the Muslim nation. The workers include two Americans, two Australians and four Germans.

The trial of the eight aid workers – employed by German-based Shelter Now International, a Christian aid organization – began last month but was suspended after the attacks on the World Trade Center and the Pentagon. Fears for their safety have increased amid the rising tensions.

John Mercer, father of American aid worker Heather Mercer called word that the trial would resume Saturday “encouraging.”

The aid workers’ Pakistani lawyer, Asif Ali, said he would leave for Kabul on Friday for the session. “I’ll do my best to defend the accused,” he told The Associated Press, adding that he had not yet received any documents relating to the charges against the workers.

Meanwhile, Taliban leader Omar said he was willing to let U.S. civil rights leader Jesse Jackson visit Afghanistan for talks – a change in tone after days of fiery calls for jihad, or holy war, if America attacks.

Omar has accepted Jackson’s “offer to mediate between the Taliban and America, and we will provide him our best possible facilities to visit Afghanistan,” said Zaeef, the Taliban ambassador.

Jackson had said in Washington that the Taliban invited him to visit neighboring Pakistan and he was considering the invitation, though there were indications the White House would discourage such a trip.

A delegation of top Islamic leaders from Pakistan was to travel to Afghanistan on Friday or Saturday, trying to pursuade the Taliban to hold direct or indirect talks with the United States about bin Laden.

The Pakistani government’s decision to assist the United States against bin Laden has drawn condemnation from militant groups inside Pakistan, who have staged many angry protests over the past week.

On Thursday, pro-government rallies were held in several cities in Pakistan to support the government’s decision to join the U.S. war against terrorism, even if it leads to a military attack on neighboring Afghanistan. But the gatherings were considerably smaller than anti-government protests in the past week organized by hard-line Islamic parties.

“Our strategy is not against the interests of Afghanistan. … We sympathize with Afghans,” Foreign Minister Abdul Sattar told a crowd of several thousand people in Islamabad.

In the border city of Peshawar, which has been a hotbed of anti-government dissent, six prominent Islamic scholars issued a fatwa, or religious ruling, saying participation in jihad against America is the duty of every Muslim if the United States attacks Afghanistan.

“Anybody who dies in the war on the American side will not go to heaven,” the ruling said. “But any Muslim who dies on the side of Afghanistan will die as a martyr and go to paradise.”