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CNN Live At Daybreak

Push Toward Afghan Capital Apparently Under Way

Aired November 12, 2001 - 08:04   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.
PAULA ZAHN, CNN ANCHOR: We begin on the front lines. As Bill Hemmer just mentioned, the push toward the Afghan capital is apparently under way. Sources tell CNN the Northern Alliance has given the order: advance toward Kabul.

But in areas, where the Northern Alliance has already taken control, life is changing dramatically. There are reports women are removing their veils and praying openly. Young girls allowed to go to school now for the first time in a long, long time.

Ben Wedeman has been following developments from inside Afghanistan. He joins us from Dashtiqala, Afghanistan. What's the latest from there, Ben?

BEN WEDEMAN, CNN CORRESPONDENT: Yes, Paula, the big development today is the fall of Herat, according to the Northern Alliance. Herat is a major city in western Afghanistan, near the Iranian border, traditionally very oriented toward Iran. It sits, as Bill mentioned just a little while ago, on the main highway south to Kandahar, which is in the southern part of the country, which is really the spiritual stronghold of the Taliban movement.

Now, that essentially leaves only two areas on the northern part of the country, the Baghlan Province and Konduz Province still under Taliban control. Now, we've seen, within the last three days essentially, the Northern Alliance expanding its area of control from 10 percent of the country to almost 40 percent. That's a very dramatic change, but the difference now is that those two provinces, Baghlan and Konduz, are predominantly Pashtun, part of the Pashtun, is an ethnic group to which the Taliban belong, and therefore, we are expecting a much higher, stiffer level of resistance from the Taliban in those areas to the Northern Alliance advance.

Now, in this area yesterday, late last night, three journalists were killed in an ambush. They were riding on the back of an armored personnel carrier that came under an ambush by the Taliban. Two -- apparently, two rocket-propelled grenades, also known as RPGs, were fired at that armored personnel carrier. One directly hitting a French radio journalist; two others fell off the APC, one a French journalist, one a German.

According to the northern front, a senior commander here, they were dragged from the back of the -- from behind the APC to a nearby trench by the Taliban troops. According to this commander, who said that they were Arabs, not Afghans. They were taken to a trench and summarily executed -- Paula.

ZAHN: How concerned are you about your own safety at this point, Ben?

WEDEMAN: Well, certainly even before last night's unfortunate events, we saw one photographer on a hill right next to us, he was possibly 50 meters away, was seriously injured in the leg from an incoming Taliban artillery shell. We're concerned, I won't pretend otherwise. This is a dangerous war. We take the precautions that we can. We avoid putting ourselves in excessive risk. And we just keep our wits about us and our heads down, and we take whatever protective measures that we can.

But we are here. We're not anywhere else, and so there is a certain amount of unavoidable risk involved -- Paula.

ZAHN: The mandate from the whole staff here: stay safe. Ben Wedeman, thanks so much for that update.

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