Taliban foreign minister surrenders

The Taliban's foreign minister turned himself in to authorities in Afghanistan, giving American forces what could be one of the biggest intelligence prizes in the war.

Mullah Abdul Wakil Muttawakil surrendered on Friday, the same day that US troops travelled to a remote site in eastern Afghanistan to determine whether top al-Qa'ida figures had been killed in a missile attack.

Muttawakil turned himself in to Afghan officials in the southern city of Kandahar, US defence officials said. The Kandahar authorities transferred him to the US military base at the city's airport, where he was being held.

US authorities were questioning Muttawakil, looking to gain valuable information, officials said. He is the highest-ranking Taliban official known to be captured so far, and could help in the search for Taliban leader Mullah Mohammed Omar and other top leaders of the radical Islamic militia.

Muttawakil was considered one of the Taliban's moderate figures. In the weeks after 11 September, his name was mentioned as someone who might be acceptable to Afghanistan's majority Pashtuns to provide an alternative leadership to the Taliban.

There were reports that he and Omar had argued about the presence of Osama Bin Laden in Afghanistan. Some reports said Muttawakil had been jailed in the last months of Taliban rule for trying to press for bin Laden to be handed over.

Muttawakil reportedly traveled in secret to Pakistan in October to urge a slowdown in US bombing so the Taliban could reconsider its decision not to turn over terror suspect Osama bin Laden.

Before Muttawakil turned himself in, the highest-ranking Taliban official in custody was the former army chief of staff, Mullah Fazel Mazloom. He is among the 186 prisoners being held at the U.S. Navy base in Guantanamo Bay, Cuba.

More than 50 US soldiers arrived at a remote spot in eastern Afghanistan's mountains Friday to determine who was killed in a CIA missile attack last Monday, said General Richard Myers, chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff.

A remote-controlled Predator spy plane fired at "some individuals," but officials do not know for sure if they were al-Qa'ida members, he said. The people were gathered near a truck in the area of Zawar Kili, a former al-Qa'ida stronghold near the border with Pakistan, he said.

The American troops started searching the area at first light today. US Defence Secretary Donald Rumsfeld discounted speculation that bin Laden was among those killed. "We just simply have no idea," he said.