Thursday November 15 8:33 PM ET

Senior Taliban Leaders May Have Been Captured

By Charles Aldinger

WASHINGTON (Reuters) - In a potential intelligence coup, Northern Alliance opposition forces on Thursday apparently captured some senior Taliban leaders in war-torn Afghanistan, a senior U.S. official said.

``We have heard that the Northern Alliance may have come into possession of some Taliban leadership earlier today,'' the official told Reuters, adding that the group did not include top Taliban leader Mullah Omar or Saudi-born fugitive Osama bin Laden, head of the anti-Western al Qaeda guerrilla network.

The official, who asked not to be identified, said the Northern Alliance had informed Washington of the apparent capture.

The official said the United States would be ``extremely interested'' in any intelligence information on the whereabouts of Mullah Omar and bin Laden, who is accused by the United States of masterminding devastating Sept. 11 attacks on America that killed more than 4,500 people.

``There was some communication'' from the Northern Alliance on the capture, said the official, who did not know where or how the prisoners had been taken.

U.S. warplanes have bombed the Taliban military and al Qaeda hide-outs for 40 days in a drive to unseat the fundamentalist Muslim Taliban and destroy al Qaeda after declaring war on terrorism in the wake of the September strikes.

$25 MILLION REWARD FOR BIN LADEN

The United States has offered a $25 million reward for information leading to the capture of bin Laden.

News of the apparent capture of some Taliban leaders came as the Taliban military reeled in retreat before a week of blitzkrieg battle gains by the Northern Alliance across north and central Afghanistan. Anti-Taliban Pashtun tribes in the south were also reported to be fighting the Taliban around Kandahar.

U.S. Army Gen. Tommy Franks, commander of the U.S. military campaign, told reporters at the Pentagon on Thursday that the destruction of al Qaeda and an end to Taliban ability to shelter bin Laden were the top priority in the Afghan war.

The Pentagon said earlier on Thursday that U.S. warplanes killed some leaders of the Taliban and al Qaeda network in two targeted bombing raids on buildings in Kabul and Kandahar on Tuesday and Wednesday.

But Defense Department spokeswoman Victoria Clarke also told reporters she could not say whether the deaths involved senior leaders and there was no evidence that bin Laden was present when the bombs struck.

``There was some leadership killed in both (strikes),'' Clarke told reporters in a briefing. ``We have no evidence that they (top leaders of the Taliban and al Qaeda) were there.''

Clarke said U.S. warplanes, acting on intelligence information, bombed a house in the capital of Kabul on Tuesday and a house in the southern Taliban stronghold of Kandahar on Wednesday.

-- Anonymous, November 15, 2001