US troops sweep mountain caves in search for fighters

Thousands of American and Afghan soldiers swept through the villages and mountains of southern Afghanistan yesterday amid an increasing number of attacks on US military positions.

About 1,000 Americans and 3,000 Afghans went house-to-house for a second day in search of members of al-Qa'ida, the Taliban and fighters loyal to the warlord Gulbuddin Hekmatyar, who is opposed to the frail US-led government of Hamid Karzai.

Afghan forces had arrested 13 people by yesterday evening on suspicion that they were fugitives from the ousted Taliban regime, said Abdul Razzak Panjshiri, security chief in the Spin Boldak area.

The American assault – the largest in more than a year – concentrated on villages and cave complexes in the Samigar mountains about 60 miles east of Kandahar, a former Taliban stronghold. The area includes the districts of Maruf, Arghistan and Shin Naray, close to the border with Pakistan.

The operation was to counter small-scale but persistent attacks against US and Karzai government forces that are becoming more frequent – a development sure to be noted by those who predict a long and difficult occupation of Iraq by the American-led coalition. Many of these attacks have been ineffectual, but three Afghan soldiers were found with their throats cut this week. In Kandahar, 25 people have been killed by bombs and rockets in the past two months alone.

As the American troops, backed by helicopters, scoured the hills in vain on the first day of the assault, 11 unguided rockets were fired towards an American base in the eastern town of Orgun-E, near the Pakistan border. None landed near their targets, said Colonel Roger King, US military spokesman at Bagram air base near Kabul.

Early yesterday, there was another rocket attack on a position in the central town of Deh Rahwood, Colonel King said. And in eastern Khost, an Afghan border post came under rocket and small arms fire before dawn, he added.