'Bin Laden most likely outside Afghanistan'

Afghanistan's foreign minister discussed the hunt for al Qaeda fugitives with Pakistan yesterday and said he thought the group's leader Osama bin Laden was no longer in his country, but somewhere in the region.

Speaking after talks with Pakistan's Minister of State for Foreign Affairs Inam-ul-Haq, Abdullah Abdullah told reporters:

"We tried very hard to find him in Afghanistan but... there is a likelihood he is outside our borders."

"Certainly it is not based on proved facts... but it is a possibility that they are hiding somewhere in this region."

Pakistan's state television said Abdullah's talks with Haq had concentrated on efforts to track down al Qaeda members who fled to Pakistan after their Taliban allies were overthrown last year by a coalition of forces which were backed by massive US air power.

Abdullah was to continue his visit with talks with President Pervez Musharraf today.

General Tommy Franks, head of the US Central Command and responsible for US operations in Afghanistan, said during a visit to Kabul on Sunday that the so-called US "war on terror" launched after the September 11 suicide hijack attacks in the United States needed to look at neighbouring countries.

Pakistan said yesterday the United States had not asked to station troops in its country and it did not need outside help in pursuing the fight against terror.

"That request has not been made so far since this action has started," Foreign Ministry spokesman Aziz Ahmad Khan told a regular news conference.

"Our armed forces don't require any help from outside. Pakistan is fully capable... of operating against any eventuality or terrorism or aggression."

Washington thinks a significant number of Taliban and al Qaeda fighters have escaped into Pakistan or Iran from Afghanistan.

US-led coalition forces have just wound up their latest major mission aimed at destroying al Qaeda resistance in Afghanistan with the arrest of just 10 suspects.

The operation, code-named Mountain Sweep, involved 2,000 troops and five combat air assaults, but apparently failed to inflict significant damage on its target.

Pakistan has been a staunch ally of the US campaign in Afghanistan and some US personnel have operated with its forces in semi-autonomous border areas of the country in the hunt for al Qaeda and Taliban fugitives.

However, there could be fierce resistance among people along the often lawless borderland to the presence of substantial numbers of US soldiers in the country, something that would likely be opposed by many ordinary Pakistanis as well.

Pakistani troops have rounded up several suspected al Qaeda militants, including one of bin Laden's top deputies Abu Zubaydah, whom it handed over to the United States in April.

Foreign Ministry spokesman Khan said the repatriation of 800-900 Pakistani supporters of the Taliban imprisoned in Afghanistan was on the agenda during Abdullah's visit.

"We hope that within a week or so we should start the process of the repatriation of prisoners," he said.

An Afghan intelligence official told Reuters earlier this month that the Afghan government would release hundreds of foreign nationals, the majority Pakistanis, caught fighting alongside the Taliban during the US-led military campaign in the country.

Pakistan had been the main supporter of the Taliban but abandoned the hardline Islamic movement after September 11 attacks, which left more than 3,000 people dead.