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Politics : Foreign Affairs Discussion Group -- Ignore unavailable to you. Want to Upgrade?

To: HG who wrote (6536)	10/21/2001 4:47:03 AM
From: HG	Read Replies (2) \| Respond to of 281500

Taliban leader appeals to Pak tribes for Jihad troops AFP (Pakistan, October 21) Taliban leader Mulla Mohammad Omar has appealed to tribes in Pakistan provinces to provide thousands of men to fight the US-led coalition in Afghanistan. The appeal was delivered through Abdul Bari Maroofi, a chief of the Rodi Alizei tribe, and relayed throughout the fiercely independent clans in Baluchistan province who hold mixed views of Omar, the Taliban and America's most wanted man Osama bin Laden. "He came to me and we are in consultation on whether to provide them or not," Abdul Bari told AFP. The initial meeting between Abdul Bari and Mullah Omar took place before the September 11 destruction in New York and Washington, over a cup of tea in the Taliban stronghold of Kandahar. The request has since been reaffirmed to tribal elders in Quetta, a Pakistani city just 280 kilometres southwest of Kandahar. Abdul Bari said he was shocked by the September 11 attacks and that Omar had given no indication of what was to come. "He would not discuss this type of issue with US, it would be a very big secret". There are about 50 main tribes of ethnic Baluch and Pashtun which can cross Pakistan's porous borders with Afghanistan and swell Taliban ranks by between 10,000 and 20,000 men. This would bolster Taliban troop strength to about 65,000 men who can easily move around the rugged mountain ranges that dominate Afghanistan's interior.