'Stand and fight,' Taleban told

A rare TV picture of the reclusive Taleban leader

Taleban leader, Mullah Mohammad Omar - said to be unhurt after US air raids in Kandahar - has ordered his fighters to stand their ground.

Reports from the Pakistan border quoted Taleban sources as saying that Mullah Omar had made a radio broadcast telling the Taleban not to yield any more ground in the face of the Northern Alliance advance.

Kandahar and the south are now in the bomb sights

"This is not a question of tribes. This is a question of Islam," Mullah Omar was quoted as saying.

Hamid Karzai - a leader of the Pashtun tribe from which the Taleban draw most of their support - says a delegation of tribal elders is trying to persuade the Taleban to surrender.

Negotiations are reported to have been going on in Kandahar - the Taleban stronghold in southern Afghanistan and the only city still under their control - and in the border town of Spin Boldak.

Heavy bombing

Former Taleban ambassador to Pakistan, Abdul Zaeef, said Mullah Omar was safe after heavy US bombing of Kandahar.

He said areas to the north and east of the city had been bombed, hitting Taleban convoys and the house of a local Taleban leader.

Kandahar airport also came under heavy bombardment, he said.

US Defence Secretary Donald Rumsfeld said American bombers had also hit a compound used by Taleban and al-Qaeda leaders to the south-east of Kandahar on Tuesday.

American helicopters and transport planes have meanwhile been flying more men and equipment into the airfield outside Kandahar where US forces have established a base.

First combat

US Marines saw their first action in Afghanistan on Tuesday, when navy fighter aircraft supported by marine helicopters attacked a military convoy, destroying about 15 vehicles near the airfield.

The strikes came as the US said it had identified more than 40 sites in Afghanistan where al-Qaeda leader Osama Bin Laden - prime suspect for the 11 September attacks on the US - could have been trying to develop weapons of mass destruction.

We'll pursue them until they have nowhere else to run

US Defence Secretary Donald Rumsfeld

The head of US Central Command, General Tommy Franks, said many of the sites were in areas now under the control of anti-Taleban forces and American teams were examining them.

General Franks said that if any weapons of mass destruction were found, they would be eradicated.

Click here for map of the battlegrounds

At least 1,000 US Marines have been deployed at Dolangi airfield near Kandahar, flown in by helicopter and C130 planes.

The current operation - called Operation Swift Freedom - is the biggest deployment of US Marines to a war zone since the Gulf War in 1991.

Tightening the noose

BBC correspondents say the marines' main function appears to be to cut off escape routes for Taleban and al-Qaeda leaders, and to attack them if they can.

The US believes Bin Laden is still in Afghanistan, in the mountains near Kandahar or Jalalabad in the east.

American officials believe that, out of an estimated 4,000 to 5,000 members of Bin Laden's al-Qaeda network in Afghanistan, several hundred have been killed, the Associated Press news agency reports.

They are believed to include seven of the group's leaders.

The United States launched military operations with the support of Britain and other allies on 7 October, after the Taleban refused to surrender Bin Laden.

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