BRUSSELS/ISLAMABAD, 5 October — The United States bolstered its coalition against terrorism yesterday, calling on allied support as a nervous world saw danger around every corner in the buildup toward attacks on Afghanistan.
NATO agreed to give military support to the US-led campaign, Britain’s Prime Minister Tony Blair unveiled evidence that Osama Bin Laden had ordered the Sept. 11 attacks on US cities, and Pakistan admitted the West had a case against him.
But as Blair arrived in Russia and US Defense Secretary Donald Rumsfeld toured Arab states to secure support for attacks on Bin Laden’s Afghan protectors, a series of dark events stoked the gathering tension.
A Russian airliner traveling from Tel Aviv to Siberia exploded over the Black Sea, leaving 76 people, most Israelis, dead or missing. The blast provoked fears that extremists had struck again. US and Russian officials at first said the jet could have been downed in error during a joint Russian-Ukrainian exercise. But the Defense Ministry in Kiev later formally denied this. Russian President Vladimir Putin said terrorism had not been ruled out as a possible cause.
Earlier, Indian commandos stormed an airliner in New Delhi airport after a false report of a hijacking spawned a national security alert.
While suspected terrorism occupied planners elsewhere, a humanitarian crisis was building in and around Afghanistan, where refugees faced starvation and an outbreak of an Ebola-style killer virus.
Pakistani health authorities said at least one Afghan who made it over the border had died of Crimean Congo Hemorrhage Fever (CCHF) and warned that thousands more could fall victim to the tick-borne, highly virulent disease.
US President George W. Bush pledged $320 million in US humanitarian aid for Afghan refugees as the World Food Program warned that the arrival of winter in the drought-ravaged hills meant “millions of lives were at stake”.
Violence continued in the Middle East, where Israeli tanks continued a two-day incursion into Palestinian territory and a disguised Palestinian gunman opened fire in an Israeli bus station, killing three passers-by.
Elsewhere in the world, the crisis continued to have dire economic consequences, including in the United States itself. A survey there showed a record 248,332 job cuts in a month, up 77 percent from before the attacks.
But despite these distractions, international leaders gave no respite to Afghanistan’s embattled Taleban regime, which has placed itself on a collision course with the US-led coalition by refusing to hand over Bin Laden.
Before setting off for Russia for talks with Putin, who has emerged as a strong backer for joint action against extremism, Blair told the British Parliament he had seen conclusive proof of Bin Laden’s guilt in the September attacks which left nearly 6,000 dead.
Bin Laden warned associates of a “major operation” against the United States shortly before the attacks and at least three of the hijackers involved in the assault were directly linked to him, Blair said.
In Pakistan, Foreign Office spokesman Riaz Muhammad Khan said: “We have seen the material that was provided to us by the US side yesterday. This material certainly provides sufficient basis for (Bin Laden’s) indictment in a court of law.”
The US decision to show Pakistan a 20-page intelligence report could provide President Pervez Musharraf with vital political cover to continue backing the US campaign despite pressure from pro-Taleban political forces in Pakistan.
The United States has threatened military action unless the Kabul militia hand over Bin Laden and shut down his Al-Qaeda movement.
In Brussels, NATO Secretary-General George Robertson announced that the 18-member alliance had approved a US request for its forces to become involved.
Forces assigned to NATO could provide intelligence, logistic support and bases, and replace any US or allied forces which pulled out of other NATO operations — such as peacekeeping in the Balkans — to go to war.
On his arrival in Moscow, Blair went straight into talks with Putin, who has already adopted an unprecedented pro-Western tone in dealing with the crisis and offered to support the coalition.
As international opinion hardened against their regime and the Afghan opposition grew in confidence and international standing, the Taleban fell back on defiance. “The movement will not hand over Bin Laden to the United States even if it receives proof of his involvement in the Sept. 11 attacks,” the militia’s ambassador to Pakistan, Abdul Salam Zaeef, told Emirati daily Al-Khaleej. “If we receive such proof, Bin Laden will be tried under Islamic law and if he is found guilty we will examine what to do,” Zaeef said.
Opposition commander Ismail Khan said Afghans in western Ghor and Bagdhis provinces were rebelling against the hard-line militia. Khan said people were ready to rebel in Herat as well, with “Death to the Taleban” graffiti appearing on walls around the city.
The opposition Northern Alliance had already claimed that more than 10,000 pro-Taleban Afghan fighters were ready to betray the militia and its allies.
In Rome Afghanistan’s exiled king has met opposition leaders and US envoys and received messages from Pakistan as preparations begin to set up a post-Taleban government. The United States has already assembled 30,000 troops, 350 aircraft and at least two aircraft carrier battle groups within striking distance of Afghanistan, with two more on the way.
The United Nations Security Council in New York set up a special committee on terrorism, chaired by Britain’s ambassador to the UN, Jeremy Greenstock, assisted by Russian, Colombian and Mauritian deputies. The committee aims to ensure that UN members comply with a wide range of legally-binding demands to exchange information on terrorist groups and deny them funds, support and safe haven.
US Defense Secretary Donald Rumsfeld yesterday played down the role of military strikes in the war against terrorism, saying there was only a “small” chance that actual terrorists would be killed. “The chance of any military action affecting any single terrorist it seems to me is small, which is why the (US) president (George W. Bush) has said this is an effort which would have to be sustained over a long period of time,” he told a press conference in Cairo.
“I have a feeling that rather than a cruise missile or a bomb, it is more likely that a scrap of intelligence information will help roll up these (terror) networks,” he said after meeting Egyptian President Hosni Mubarak in Cairo.Mubarak earlier said his country “supports the fight against terrorism but will not take part with troops,” adding that Rumsfeld was not seeking Egypt’s military participation in a response to attacks on the United States. Rumsfeld said Bush and Mubarak were like-minded on the need to combat terrorism after the Sept. 11 attacks.
Asked about Egypt’s position on military involvement, he said the United States recognizes and accepts that each country has different circumstances. He also warned of the possible disastrous consequences of weapons of mass destruction falling into the hands of terrorists.
