Asian tourism suffers
as attack gloom spreads

BINTAN (INDONESIA), Oct 1: Resort Manager Peter Ho watched nervously as news broadcasters talked about Americans being threatened in the Indonesia city of solo. ........more

Khyber Pass splits
nations as well as
loyalties

KHYBER PASS (PAKISTAN), Oct 1: Pakistani Pashtun chiefs with strong tribal links across the Khyber Pass in Afghanistan have pledged support to ...more

Taliban hide Bin Laden,
handover hope seen dim

KABUL, Oct 1: Afghanistan’s ruling Taliban were poised today for a showdown with the world’s most modern Army after admitting holding the ....more

Britain freezes
Taliban accounts

BRIGHTON (ENGLAND), Oct 1: Britain has frozen 88 million dollars of assets linked to Afghanistan’s ruling Taliban regime, Finance Minister Gordon Brown was due to announce today. .......more

US ropes in dissident
Taliban commander to
take on Omar

ISLAMABAD, Oct 1: The US and its allies have roped in former Taliban commander Ismail Khan as anti-Taliban forces began positioning themselves ........more

Pakistani Islamic
Party urges diplomats
to protect Afghans

ISLAMABAD, Oct 1; A Pakistani Islamic Party stepped up its efforts in support of Afghanistan’s isolated ruling Taliban by writing letters today to .....more

Exiled Afghans turn
to old ways for new leader

ISLAMABAD, Oct 1: Imagine a vast hall packed with hundreds of men sporting turbans, Persian lamb hats or embroidered quilt coats..........more

Alliance holds key
mountain pass
against Taliban

SALANG PASS (AFGHANISTAN), Oct 1: White-bearded Mohammad Alem and his nine nephews in the opposition Northern Alliance are helping to hold ........more

Asian tourism suffers as attack gloom spreads

BINTAN (INDONESIA), Oct 1: Resort Manager Peter Ho watched nervously as news broadcasters talked about Americans being threatened in the Indonesia city of solo.

To him and other resort managers on this Indonesian island, such news can mean lost business, especially since many tourists are already nervous about travelling after the US hijack attacks that have been blamed on Islamic militants.

So far there are no cancellations at Ho’s resort, Mana Mana Beach Club, only an hour by boat from peaceful Singapore.

And with Solo about 1,100 km (680 miles) away in central Java, the fury of Islamic hardliners threatening to forcibly expel US citizens if Washington strikes Afghanistan looks remote.

"But people don’t make a distinction between solo and the rest of Indonesia," he said, pausing before adding, "you have to remember Indonesia is a Muslim country."

Across Asia, the threat of rising Islamic militancy is casting a shadow over some of the world’s most tranquil getaways, threatening to compound a slowdown in travel around the region.

The other deterrent for visitors is a plain fear of flying in the wake of the September 11 attacks.

Tour operators hope Washington avoids a heavy-handed retaliation that could stir up religious unrest and make a fragile situation even worse.

So far, the impact of the US attacks has been mixed for Asia’s tourism industry, a top source of foreign exchange for many countries and a key driver for recession-hit industries in the region such as retailing.

In Indonesia’s holiday island of Bali, many operators hope visitors from other Asian countries, especially Japan, can plug a hole left by dwindling numbers of Americans and Europeans.

"There has been a drop in the American and European market and we already had a significant number of cancellations," I Gde Pitana, head of Bali’s Tourist Board, told Reuters.

"But American tourists only represent a small number of total tourists coming to Bali," he added. "We’re confident that we can plug the drop by enticing more of Japanese tourists coming here, so our focus now is Bali for Asia."

Washington said it was concerned about inadequate protection for Americans in Indonesia, the world’s biggest Muslim nation, after 4,000 protesters condemned the US on Friday, some threatening to round up Americans from hotels and expel them.

Even Nepal’s tourism industry, a mainstay of the Himalayan Kingdom’s impoverished economy, has been hit hard, with more than 50 percent of hotel bookings for the peak September-November tourist season cancelled since the attacks.

"We are even receiving cancellations for March and April next year," said Hotel Association Nepal chief, Narendra Bajracharya.

India’s proximity to a potential theatre of conflict in Afghanistan following the strikes on the United States has also hurt its tourism industry, officials say.

A little over 2.6 million foreigners, many of them hardy budget travellers and backpackers, visited the country last year.

"New bookings are not coming in, and people abroad are looking at how developments shape up," said Murali Dhar, president of the Indian Association of Tour Operators and a retired Army major.

"But I personally feel there will be no war, and even if a conflict takes place India will not be that much affected."

HK squeezed China braces for worse ahead

In Hong Kong, travel agents said last week as many as 6,000 people in the travel industry could lose their jobs after a wave of cancelled bookings, mostly by people too frightened to fly.

"There are over 20,000 staff employed by travel agents in Hong Kong. Information i collect from my colleagues is that 20 to 30 percent may be facing layoffs if the situation remains as it is for another six months," Ronnie Yuen, Chairman of the Travel Industry Council, told a news conference.

Some hotels, according to the Hong Kong Hotels Association, saw occupancy shrivel to only 50 percent after the attacks when they would usually expected to fill 80 percent of their rooms.

The Hong Kong Tourism Board said it now expected no growth in tourist arrivals this year. It had earlier forecast arrivals would grow by nearly eight percent from last year.

In China, where tourism is a major source of foreign exchange, companies have already seen a slowdown in visitors from the United States and other countries and are expecting things to get worse.

"There are cancellations every day. Some groups which originally had dozens of people turn out to only have a few people coming to China," said an official of state-owned China international travel service.

"So far, about 2,000 of our customers from North America have cancelled their trips to China."

Xinjiang Airlines, based in the restive northwest Xinjiang region, which is home to many ethnic Uighur Muslims, has stepped up security on some international flights. (REUTERS)

Khyber Pass splits nations as well as loyalties

KHYBER PASS (PAKISTAN), Oct 1: Pakistani Pashtun chiefs with strong tribal links across the Khyber Pass in Afghanistan have pledged support to Islamabad but warn they are uncertain how their people will react if the United States attacked the Taliban.

"Pakistan is our country, we are residents of Pakistan, we are soldiers of Pakistan, we are ready to lay our lives, our souls and our property for Pakistan," said Malik Haji Khanzeb, a tribal elder of Kukikhel tribe in a remote village in what is known as the Khyber agency.

But that loyalty is being held up against blood ties with tribal relations across the border and tested by US threats to track down Osama Bin Laden — who lives as a guest of Afghanistan’s Taliban rulers — and punish his protectors.

Saudi dissident Bin Laden is the chief suspect for the devastating September 11 suicide attacks on Washington and New York in which some 6,500 people are feared dead.

"If they do not have any proof against Osama, we cannot allow any strike," said Khanzeb, sitting on a Verandah meant for male guests. By tribal tradition, women remain in Purdah (veil) in an inner sanctum.

Their reaction is crucial for Pakistan’s President Pervez Musharraf who has pledged support to Washington but faces stiff resistance and possible backlash from Islamic groups who oppose any action against the Taliban.

The Khyber Pass tribes have blood ties with Afghanistan and their social and economic wellbeing crosses the border that separates the two countries.

Several million people from more than a dozen Pashtun tribes live in the area that hugs the north west frontier province along Afghanistan’s border.

Loyalty, honour as important as life

They are a proud people, where loyalty and honour are revered as much as life itself. That same honour keeps the Taliban from handing over Bin Laden on the grounds that he asked them for sanctuary and is therefore a "guest".

"If there is any proof against Osama he can decide," Khanzeb told Reuters in an interview, as he fingers prayer beads while five fierce armed guards stood in a circle behind him.

"If there is proof he should be punished. If not, then he should not be punished," Khanzeb repeated, stressing the strict code of tribal justice under which pashtuns have lived and protected for centuries.

Few of Pakistan’s national laws apply in the tribal areas, where legal disputes are settled in an age-old fashion.

Under the tribal system, a Jirga (gathering of elders), weighs all evidence, accusations and the defence, and takes a collective decision. It is quick, simple but ruthless. It makes no distinction between friend and foe, between father and son.

Punishment is based on "eye for an eye" — swift and if the guilty is not available, the closest relative suffers instead.

The system has managed to survive because it seems to work. Even though most tribal people are armed to the teeth, violent crime is rare and murder almost unheard of.

Many tribal people believe Bin Laden should be subject to a similar system of judgment rather than the alien adversorial US way in which guilt and innocence is seen to be settled on the basis of the ability of the defendant’s lawyer.

"Tribals feel that Osama Bin Laden is not involved in this. If Americans have proof then it should be presented to the world," said 25-year-old, Zarmin Khan, leader of a private youth organisation Kukikhel (tribe).

Fiercely independent but devout Muslims, many tribals said they did not understand how a muslim could be a "terrorist" as Washington has labelled Bin Laden.

"Islam does not give such a permission (of terrorism). It is permissable to kill in a battlefield but there is no permission to kill women and children," Khan said.

For the Pashtuns, who take courage, bravery and fighting as a matter of tribal pride, terrorism is an idea they abhor.

"Men fight openly," said a fruit seller in Jamrud Bazaar, under the shadows of Khyber Pass, the gateway to Afghanistan.

"Muslims fight openly," the fruit-seller said. (REUTERS)

Taliban hide Bin Laden, handover hope seen dim

KABUL, Oct 1: Afghanistan’s ruling Taliban were poised today for a showdown with the world’s most modern Army after admitting holding the world’s most wanted man at a secret location and showing no sign of handing him over.

The position of the Taliban, and their spiritual leader Mullah Mohammad Omar, has never looked more perilous with only one diplomatic ally remaining, signs of dissent growing within their territory, the opposition nipping at their frontlines and Washington insisting that they surrender Osama Bin Laden.

In a sign of the Taliban’s apparent realisation of the danger, omar took the unusual step of speaking to his people late yesterday over his voice of Shariat radio and warning ex-king Mohammad Zahir Shah not to meddle in Afghanistan’s affairs.

"Forget Afghanistan, you won’t be able to solve the issue of Afghanistan in your lifetime," the reclusive Taliban leader said in a broadcast monitored by Reuters in neighbouring Pakistan.

"How dare you think you can return to Afghanistan backed by the United States. How are you going to rule the country? how can you think of such things?"

The former king, deposed by his cousin in 1973, met members of the US congress on Sunday and a delegation from Afghanistan’s main anti-Taliban force, the Northern Alliance, in Italy to see if it can strike a cooperation deal with the royalist faction.

For the first time since the September 11 suicide hijacking attacks on the World Trade Center and the Pentagon, the Taliban revealed yesterday that they did indeed have the top suspect in the attacks, Saudi-born fugitive Bin Laden, in their hands.

Confirmation that Bin Laden was in Taliban hands increased pressure on Kabul to surrender him to avoid threatened US strikes.

Previously, the Taliban had said the millionaire was missing.

"Osama is in Afghanistan, but he is at an unknown place for his safety and security," the Taliban Ambassador to Pakistan, Mullah Abdul Salam Zaeef, told reporters in Islamabad.

"Only security people know about his whereabouts... Osama Bin Laden is under our control."

But Mullah Zaeef said Bin Laden had not responded to a request from clerics and from Mullah Omar to leave at his own leisure. "The Ulema (council of clerics) recommendation was handed to him," Mullah Zaeef said. "There has been no response".

Pakistani President Pervez Musharraf told CNN yesterday that hopes were dim that the Taliban would hand over Bin Laden.

"I would say, yes, we haven’t been able to succeed in moderating their views on surrendering Osama Bin Laden," said Musharraf, who has sent two abortive missions to Omar to try to convince him to surrender Bin Laden.

"But we have our doors open and some progress has been made and we hope a little more progress can be made."

The President, who has thrown his weight behind the US decision to wage war on terrorism, was cautious in giving any details of US military operations in the region but did not rule out a future US presence.

"I don’t at all know who are based on Afghanistan but I am certainly very clear that nobody is based on Pakistan as yet."

Pakistan, which helped to create the Taliban and has backed them during their five years of rule from Kabul, is now the only country to recognise the puritanical Islamic movement as the Government of Afghanistan.

Even as the Taliban revealed that they held Bin Laden, signs of dissent appeared in areas under their control with authorities saying they had arrested six people for distributing "pro-American" pamphlets that called for the return of Zahir Shah.

The opposition Northern Alliance forces reported a rash of desertions by Taliban fighters, who they said were being beaten back in the north of the embattled country.

Alliance spokesman Sayed Najibullah Hashimi said 350 Taliban fighters had switched sides in the westerly province of Badghis yesterday, while 240 had deserted a day earlier in Laghman.

The pakistan-based Afghan Islamic Press (AIP) quoted a Taliban spokesman as confirming that some troops had joined the opposition in Laghman, but said their commander, Mohammad Suleman, had been "wanted" and had taken only 70 men with him.

Hashimi said opposition commander Ismail Khan had gained ground close to Qalaye now, the provincial capital of Badghis, in a fierce battle in which several Taliban fighters had died.

AIP quoted the Governor of Khost Province, Mullah Abdoor Raoof, as saying six people had been arrested for scattering pamphlets in the streets and bazaars of the towns of Khost and Gardez at night.

The leaflets said the United States was not an enemy and people should support the ex-king, who is now being touted as a possible unifying figure in Afghanistan should the crisis result in the disintegration of the current Government.

In the eastern city of Jalalabad, the Taliban’s order to the population not to flee was largely ignored.

Video pictures obtained by reuters showed the once-bustling market city as a virtual ghost town with shops closed, streets nearly empty and houses locked and barred.

With people fleeing the cities in fear of US attacks, the United Nations was rushing to head off a humanitarian disaster, sending food into Afghanistan and stockpiling other supplies inside the Pakistani border in preparation for a potential flood of refugees.

A convoy of eight trucks carrying 218 tonnes of wheat left the frontier city of Peshawar, crossed the Khyber Pass early on sunday and headed up the road to Kabul, world food programme spokesman Khaled Mansour said.

A second convoy of six trucks carrying 200 tonnes of wheat crossed the frontier north of Quetta in southwest Pakistan. Half was destined for Kabul and half for the westerly city of Herat.

The UN Children’s Fund UNICEF was sending 200 tonnes of food and clothing for children in opposition-controlled areas in the north of Afghanistan via Northern Pakistan over high mountain passes requiring mule trains. (REUTERS)

Alliance holds key mountain pass against Taliban

SALANG PASS (AFGHANISTAN), Oct 1: White-bearded Mohammad Alem and his nine nephews in the opposition Northern Alliance are helping to hold the most strategic pass in northern Afghanistan against the ruling Taliban.

They just hope the cavalry will arrive soon in the form of US forces seeking to hunt down Osama Bin Laden, their prime suspect in the September 11 attacks on the United States, and punish his Taliban protectors.

"If the Taliban come, we will stop them," said Alem.

The eyrie that he guards is at the heart of the legendary Hindu Kush, a barren mountain ridge that stretches across the breadth of Afghanistan in a jagged granite wall dividing north from south.

Perched at the very crest, in a nest beside a heavy machinegun, Alem has spent the last 21 of his 60 years battling in the Salang Pass.

Along with his nine nephews, alem commands a machinegun, six Kalashnikovs, two grenade launchers and a spectacular view of a green lake and the mountain road descending to the north, from where any Taliban advance would probably come.

The US military, who may be hoping to dislodge the Taliban with a mixture of air strikes and special forces operations far to the south, will be counting on alem and his nephews to hold firm.

Alliance to cut troops from bases

For alem’s Northern Alliance, which has battled the Taliban ever since the puritanical Islamic movement threw them out of power half a decade ago, the key to victory lies in cutting off the taliban troops in the north from their bases in the south by sealing the routes across the Hindu Kush.

The main route is this pass, where the soviets once built the world’s highest tunnel, linking central asia to the Indian subcontinent.

Its strategic importance is legendary. Soviet troops battling to keep the route open called it the road of death. They never held it securely, and the carcasses of their tanks still litter the gorge.

Today, it is in the hands of the alliance, which has dynamited the tunnel’s entrance and guards the pass above it.

Without this route, Taliban forces operating in the north must use alternative supply routes that take days instead of hours, said General Basir Salangi who commands the alliance forces here.

"That is why getting this gorge is their greatest dream," he said.

Alliance hopes for US strikes

Anticipating US strikes, the alliance is hoping not only to keep salang shut but to close the alternative routes as well, allowing their forces in the north to deliver a quick and decisive blow to Taliban fighters trapped there.

Alliance officials say they hope American strikes will make that possible, both by providing support for an alliance assault and by persuading local commanders allied to the taliban to switch sides.

"I America strikes Kabul and other Taliban targets, the commanders (controlling the roads) will come over to our side. We have already agreed with them," said Salangi.

"If we can close those roads and America strikes the taliban, we can take Mazar and Kunduz... Within a week we can sweep the Taliban out of the north. They will be left with nothing but their bases near the Pakistani border," he said.

"You can write that down. You’ll see."

Up on the mountaintop, Mohammad Alem knows little of any US plans. Soviet air strikes killed his father, his brother and his sister. Now, he sees the Pakistan-backed Taliban as the invaders.

His 18-year-old nephew Abdul said has already been armed and at his side for four years.

Alem’s few remaining teeth are yellow, his white beard is thinning, but he darts nimbly up the cliffside carrying a box of ammunition.

"As long as I still have the strength, I will go on fighting," he says. (REUTERS)