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CNN Live Today
America Under Attack: Afghanistan Denies Involvement
Aired September 12, 2001 - 13:22 ET
THIS IS A RUSH TRANSCRIPT. THIS COPY MAY NOT BE IN ITS FINAL FORM AND MAY BE UPDATED.
THIS IS A RUSH TRANSCRIPT. THIS COPY MAY NOT BE IN ITS FINAL FORM AND MAY BE UPDATED.
LOU WATERS: The Taliban of Afghanistan has been meeting, as it had been rather intensely yesterday meeting, and responding to reporters' questions, trying to deflect any accusations of its involvement with Osama bin Laden or the attack on the World Trade Towers or the Pentagon.
We have Nic Robertson by videophone from Kabul in Afghanistan, the capital, where Taliban officials have been meeting. He has the latest developments from there. Nic.
NIC ROBERTSON, CNN CORRESPONDENT: Well, Lou, big developments here late this afternoon. CNN reported a few hours ago that senior Pakistani diplomats were meeting with senior Taliban officials.
Now Pakistan is one of the only three countries in the world to recognize the Taliban as the rightful leader of Afghanistan and Pakistan is widely regarded as one of the only countries that can have influence with the Taliban leadership. Now CNN has learned that the Pakistani diplomats were asked to pass a message to Taliban leadership. We have also learned that that meeting concluded inconclusively, diplomatic language, but not a positive outcome.
What happened after that? Almost immediately we received a call from the senior Taliban spokesman, Abdul Hai Mutmaen, with a new message from the Taliban, again condemning the attack in the United States, calling it a sad humanitarian catastrophe. Saying that they had the sympathy of the people in the United States. But going beyond any Taliban statement so far, he said they appeal to the United States not to attack Afghanistan. They said the people of Afghanistan are already in a great deal of misery.
They said that killing the leaders of the Taliban in Afghanistan, they said would not help the people of Afghanistan. He went on to say that any attack on Afghanistan would cause resentment within the region, that would be a negative thing.
He also talked about Osama bin Laden. He said Osama bin Laden had a following of the people. He said that the press record of Osama bin Laden often attributed things to him that were perhaps weren't relevant.
This, all this message, all this statement wrapped up by the final line, appealing to the United States, saying they hope that sanity prevails in the United States. Now putting together the diplomatic jigsaw that's happened here, Lou, a failed diplomatic meeting with senior Taliban officials where an international message would pass the Taliban. The Taliban, shortly afterwards then releasing a statement appealing to the United States not to attack Afghanistan, not to kill its leaders, to think seriously about the consequences of any action in this region and the Taliban saying they hope sanity in the United States prevails. Lou.
WATERS: Nic, as you know, the United States has appealed to Afghanistan a number of time to extradite Osama bin Laden to the United States for prosecution in connection with the first World Trade Center bombing and the bombings of the U.S. embassies in Kenya and Tanzania.
Do you know if there's been any further attempts by the United States to ask for that extradition and what the answer to that might have been?
ROBERTSON: Lou, one of the questions we had for our diplomatic sources today was what was in that message that was passed by the Pakistani officials to the Taliban officials. We could not get any comments on what that message was. We only know that it was delivered and that the message was -- the meeting was "inconclusive".
It is highly likely that in any scenario regarding talks, international talks with the Taliban, the issue of Osama bin Laden would come up. The United Nations has placed sanctions on the Taliban for failing to handover Osama bin Laden as requested.
United Nations today called out all its international staff from Afghanistan. Its done this at times of high tension before but a key difference today when the United Nations staff pulled out, the last of them to leave early tomorrow morning, when they pulled out today they paid off all their local staff. They took their computer software, disk and unusually they took a lot of their hard-copy key documents as well with them. Lou.
WATERS: Nic Robertson on the ground in the capital of Afghanistan, Kabul, where the Taliban has been meeting and has, again, condemned yesterday's terrorist attacks on the United States and has pleaded with the United States of America not to attack its country.
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