News-Info-Alerts

Re: Capture or Kill an American GI, Receive a Reward

To: ALL

From: Andi Wolos & Bob Necci

(POW-MIA InterNetwork)

Date: April 07, 2002

"Afghan leaflets offer reward for killing troops

BAGRAM AIR BASE, Afghanistan (Reuters) - The U.S. military said on Friday leaflets were circulating in eastern Afghanistan offering rewards for killing foreigners connected to the international drive against the Taliban and al Qaeda.

"We continue to receive credible threats of violence against coalition service members, citizens and journalists," U.S. military spokesman Major Bryan Hilferty told a news conference at Bagram Air Base, just north of Kabul.

"There have also been leaflets found in Paktia province offering rewards for capturing or killing coalition members," he said of the eastern province where the biggest ground engagement of the latest Afghan War ended last month.

Hilferty said he did not know the exact size of the rewards being offered.

"I think it's above a thousand" U.S. dollars, he said.

Hilferty said Paktia's Shahi Kot Valley area -- the centre of last month's heavy fighting -- was largely cleared of armed opposition and international forces were concentrating reconnaissance and searches in nearby areas around Gardez and Khost.

The U.S.-led coalition says it killed hundreds of al Qaeda and Taliban fighters in and around the Shahi Kot Valley.

Some Afghan commanders say those figures are exaggerated and many rebels slipped deeper into the mountains or across the rugged border into Pakistan.

Hilferty elaborated on an attack on Wednesday, saying some several hundred Afghan soldiers and dozens of U.S. special forces patrolling the Shahi Kot area were targeted but unharmed by five tube-launched rockets.

"We think they came from several kilometres away," he said. "We think they came from the south of the Shahi Kot Valley area."

U.S. officers said on Thursday the rocket attack was a "good indication" that al Qaeda and Taliban fighters remained active in the region.

Washington blames the al Qaeda network for the September 11 attacks on the United States.

The Taliban, which ruled most of Afghanistan for five years under a strict interpretation of Islam, were targeted by the coalition for harbouring al Qaeda leader Osama bin Laden and his fighters. "