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CNN Saturday Morning News

Northern Alliance: bin Laden Not in Tora Bora

Aired December 01, 2001 - 10:24   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.
MARTIN SAVIDGE, CNN ANCHOR: We're going to break from the plan now to go to the telephone. CNN's Ben Wedeman joining us from Kabul with information pertaining to the possible whereabouts of Osama bin Laden, the man behind -- well, people would say behind it all -- Ben.

BEN WEDEMAN, CNN CORRESPONDENT: Yes, Martin. We just got out of a news conference with Abdullah Abdullah, the secretary -- foreign secretary of the Northern Alliance. He says that according to his information and the information of the Northern Alliance, Osama bin Laden is somewhere in southern Afghanistan. The Taliban still control three to four provinces in the area. It's still not really clear how many.

But he says their information is that Osama bin Laden is down there. He says that al Qaeda and the Taliban are preparing to engage in protracted guerrilla warfare. What he's -- he also said that according to the information of the Northern Alliance and of course, this cannot be verified, that Osama bin Laden is not in the Tora Bora area, which is a very rugged and mountainous area to the south of the eastern Afghan city of Jalalabad and next -- near the Pakistani border.

He says that there are still functioning bases of the al Qaeda organization in that area. But he says that the area -- the Tora Bora area is at the moment completely surrounded by anti-Taliban forces -- Martin.

SAVIDGE: Is there an indication from this news conference then that Osama bin Laden has moved, say from Tora Bora and then gone south or he just hasn't been up there at all?

WEDEMAN: Well, in -- his implication is that he's always been in the southern part of the country. There's been a good deal of speculation in the media that he could be in the Tora Bora area. The reason for that being that apparently, that the al Qaeda organization has a number of bases. It also includes very deep caves with high- tech defense or security mechanisms in those areas. And that's probably one of the reasons why there's been so much speculation about him being in the Tora Bora area.

But at the same time, there's also been a good deal of speculation that he's in the southern part of the country. And I must stress that this is coming from the Northern Alliance, their intelligence sources. But this cannot be confirmed. But certainly, it's a much larger area that the Taliban still controls in the southern part of the country, which would indicate that Osama bin Laden and his associates have a much larger area in which to move around.

And we also know that there's a good deal of movement over the southern border of Afghanistan into Pakistan by Taliban officials and high officials in fact. So the indication would be that he's more likely in the southern part of the country.

SAVIDGE: And Ben, would that also be an indication he may be planning to retreat to the mountains and carry on a guerrilla campaign from there?

WEDEMAN: That is -- that is what Abdullah Abdullah said, that they're changing -- they could be changing tactics to -- rather than trying to hold on these large areas of territory, rather making it more difficult for any opposing force to control those areas. But he didn't go into too many specifics about what he thinks could be the next phase in the area -- Martin.

SAVIDGE: Ben Wedeman joining us on the telephone from Kabul with the latest information on the Northern Alliance on the possible whereabouts of Osama bin Laden. Thank you very much.

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