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American Morning

Concerns About Quick Power Shift in Kabul; Update on Flight 587 Crash

Aired November 13, 2001 - 10:31   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.
BILL HEMMER, CNN ANCHOR: There are concerns, too, concerns about the power shift there. Officials in neighboring Pakistan are calling on the U.N. to put a peacekeeping force in place in the capital city.

CNN's Tom Mintier joins us from Islamabad with more.

Tom, Hello.

TOM MINTER, CNN CORRESPONDENT: Hello, Bill.

There is a great deal of concern, by Pakistan especially in the foreign ministry tonight. The lights I'm sure are burning late. President Musharraf will arrive later tonight. President Musharraf was in the United States, and is on way back, as the Northern Alliance made his way into Kabul. The word from here is they are indeed concerned. They do want the United Nations to put a multinational peacekeeping force on the ground, to basically take administrative control.

Joining us now is Rifat Hussain.

Pakistan did not want this to happen, but it happened anyway. There were some reporters at the press briefing today blaming the United States for allowing this or ensuring it would happen.

RIFAT HUSSAIN, MILITARY ANALYST: I don't think that you can really blame the United States for it. Though I think you can blame the American bombing campaign for opening the floodgates for the Northern Alliance to move into Afghanistan. And this is a situation that, frankly, nobody had anticipated, that this was going to be such a rapid and stunning retreat by the Taliban.

MINTIER: But there has been no indication so far that the Northern Alliance is going to put a government into place. They have Kabul. They have the capital. De facto, they have Afghanistan.

HUSSAIN: That I think from now onwards, it is the reality of their power, the power inside Kabul which is going to dictate a political outcome, and that is something Pakistan didn't want.

MINTIER: That political outcome is putting together a multiethnic government. The president in his visit to Istanbul, Turkey said that it must be representative of all ethnic groups. HUSSAIN: Well, not only the American president and, in fact, a few moments ago, British Prime Minister Tony Blair had also said the same thing. The question is that the harder you really bring that about, because while the Northern Alliance forces are inside Kabul, the Taliban have retreated, and then you have the reality, because the possession is 9/10ths of the law. The question is, how do you really reverse that and get them to agree to the whole idea of a broad-based government. I'm not really sure the Northern Alliance is understanding the things that King Zahir (ph) (UNINTELLIGIBLE) about this idea of this supreme national unity council is relevant (ph) anymore.

MINTIER: What about the Taliban? They basically backed out of Kabul, much in the same way that the Northern Alliance backed out in 1996. Are they going to fight a guerrilla war now in the mountains? And some are calling this a trap, a move to basically lure others into Kabul, and then turn around and launch an attack?

HUSSAIN: I think the Taliban had seen it coming for a very long time, and they actually are now following the same strategy that the Mujahedeen had followed against the Soviets. That is you concede control over cities, and then you move into the rural areas and they would like to fight with their (UNINTELLIGIBLE), which is fight from the Pashtun areas against the Northern Alliance and not fight their weakness, which was, you know, that if they would have stayed, then Kabul (UNINTELLIGIBLE).

Rifat Hussain, thank you very much. So we are going to wait and see what the political developments are in the days, weeks, even months ahead, and whether indeed how important this advance by the Northern Alliance into the city of Kabul really is -- Bill.

HEMMER: All right, Tom Mintier from Islamabad.

And certainly the U.S. relationship with Pakistan has developed quite quickly over the past two months, more on that momentarily, but we're also told that as the Taliban left Kabul, they took the eight international aid workers they've been holding with them. Those workers accused of spreading Christianity. A guard from the abandoned detention center is quoted as saying that the Taliban took the workers south to the town of Kandahar. Two Americans are among those held.

And the father of one of those women talked about the uncertainty surrounding that case.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

JOHN MERCER, FATHER OF DETAINED AID WORKER: It's quite possible the Taliban want to consider that they still have an affective government and they still will have a trial in Kandahar. I mean, that's one way to look at it. The other way they may be pawns for some leverage and political negotiations. I still have hope that the Taliban have kept them safe for over 100 days now, and that they will continue to do so.

(END VIDEO CLIP) HEMMER: John Mercer has been in Islamabad for most of this ordeal. He also says certainly he hopes that case will be resolved soon.

The other major story we're following this morning back in this country, certainly the fallout from crash of American Airlines flight 587. As you can imagine, there is still a sense of disbelief and shock in the Queens neighborhood where that plane went down. At least 260 people died in yesterday's crash, and for an update now on the investigation front, CNN's Susan Candiotti with us live in Washington.

Are we learning anything just yet, Susan?

SUSAN CANDIOTTI, CNN CORRESPONDENT: Well, information hard to come by right now, Bill, as investigators continue to look very hard for the flight data recorder. So far, unable to find it at the crash site. If they cannot spot that flight data recorder in the wreckage on the ground, they might have to search Jamaica Bay. Now that could provide critical information about the engines ,the fuel tanks, the plane's climb after takeoff and much more. The National Transportation Safety Board also wants to check radar returns recorded at different sites. That could tell them when the plane started breaking apart and in what order.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

PETER GOELZ, FMR. MANAGING DIR., NTSB: With six different stations, you would -- might be able to get a very clear picture of the plane's final moments. And you might be able to pick up if things were coming off the aircraft while it was in flight. You might get a primary or secondary return that would show a significant piece of the aircraft exited its fuselage.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

CANDIOTTI: NTBS investigators tell CNN they hope to be able to learn fairly soon whether the engines suffered a catastrophic mechanical failure. The engines will be taken apart to look for obvious signs of breakdown. Both engines landed a few blocks apart from each other.

Foul play not excluded as a cause. However, there are no early indications of sabotage.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

MARION BLAKEY, NTSB CHAIRWOMAN: We have recovered the voice -- cockpit voice recorder and, in fact, everything we have learned at this point from that as well as other sources tells us that we are proceeding appropriately considering this to be an accident.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

CANDIOTTI: The cockpit voice recorder shows the copilot at the controls during takeoff, nothing out of the ordinary there. The Airbus flight 587 left the ground at 9:14, and less than four minutes later, debris started falling. At this point, there are no sounds to indicate anything other than an accident -- Bill.

HEMMER: Susan Candiotti in Washington. Susan, thank you.

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