A spokesman for the Taleban, Maulana Masoom Janan, said: "We will not initiate fighting during Ramadan."

The opposition Northern Alliance, which is fighting Taleban forces north of Kabul, made its truce offer through Commander Baba Jaan.

The Taleban also said it had released 450 prisoners from prison in Kabul, as a gesture of goodwill, the London-based Al-Hayat newspaper reported.

Ramadan began on Thursday. Muslims are forbidden from eating and drinking until sundown during the month-long fasting period.

Aid convoys

Both Commander Jaan and Maulana Janan have been involved in a tripartite commission with the United Nations to negotiate a safe corridor through the frontline.

Since Monday, convoys from the UN's World Food Programme have been sent from Taleban-held Kabul to the opposition-controlled Panjshir Valley, 100 km to the north.

They carried supplies of wheat and clothes, urgently required by civilians displaced by the fighting.

Isireli Degu, the UN's deputy field security officer in Afghanistan, said the aid convoys were "progressing well".

The BBC's Kate Clark in the Panjshir Valley says tens of thousands of civilians are still sheltering there after fleeing fighting last summer.

Last July, Taleban forces launched an offensive in the Shomali Valley, north of Kabul, which was repelled by opposition forces led by commander Ahmed Shah Masoud