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CNN Live Sunday

Latest on U.S. Air Strikes

Aired October 14, 2001 - 16:04   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.
STEPHEN FRAZIER, CNN ANCHOR: We are hearing now that U.S. airstrikes today are targeting artillery and heavy armor that had been moved to the mountains outside the Afghan capital, Kabul. And here are live pictures now of those attacks going on.

While we look at those, let's bring in CNN's John Vause, who has the latest details from Islamabad, Pakistan.

And John, I guess when we say heavy armor, we mean tanks?

JOHN VAUSE, CNN CORRESPONDENT: That's right, Stephen. Also some antiaircraft artillery which the Taliban obviously is trying to get out of the way of those air strikes; trying to keep some for of their defenses by hiding them in the mountains. Those mountains were targeted. We know that for most of today the capital of Kabul was fairly quiet, but those air strikes began a couple of hours ago, and we believe they are continuing.

Kandahar, on the other hand, has been pretty much targeted all day. Our people inside Afghanistan tell us that -- inside the city of Kandahar -- tell us now that they're hearing very loud explosions, possibly in the city or close by the city, saying which (sic) has been happening pretty much around the clock there.

We can see through that nightscope, that green vision that -- which we have been getting through the videophone, occasionally traces of what appears to be antiaircraft fire. But, indeed, there are reports that the antiaircraft fire seems to be diminishing, which could indicate that possibly those forces on the ground have either been taken out or moved up into the mountains.

Now this strike comes as the Taliban make up another offer to hand over Osama bin Laden. As we heard in John King's report, the White House dismissing that out of hand. The important thing to note with this offer is who it's come from and when. It comes from the deputy prime minister, a very senior figure in the Taliban. It also comes after a week of these intensive air strikes.

Now, it could be read that this is a sign that the Taliban are weakening; that their resolve is starting to weaken and that they're trying to find some way out of this current crisis, or it could just be a matter of convenience. We know that there's a group of foreign journalists inside Afghanistan for the first time, and it could have just been a movement of opportunity for the deputy prime minister to make that offer to a journalist there.

But as we say, those airstrikes continuing. And that group of foreign journalists were taken by the Taliban on a media tour to show them some of the damage which has been inflicted on these U.S. air strikes. They were taken to a village just outside Jalalabad. They were shown bunkers and craters in the ground; they were shown damaged buildings. And they were also taken to a hospital, where doctors say they've treated about 28 people, included eight children, mainly for broken bones and cuts and bruises.

Now, Washington has expressed regret about the civilian casualties. They knew there would be civilian casualties. They have stressed time and time again that they've tried to avoid them, but they knew that it would be inevitable. Whenever you engage in air strikes against a society -- cities there, of course, will be casualties like we're seeing now.

But also for that group of journalists on that media tour outside that village they were confronted by a fairly angry mob who were chanting anti-U.S. slogans. And they were also chanting Osama bin Laden's name; and Stephen, they were calling him a hero.

FRAZIER: John, we're looking at pictures of that demonstration as you talk to us. I'd like to take you back and ask you, if you would, to analyze these green nightscope pictures. I'm not sure you're seeing, live, what we are. But just in general the picture we're looking at that's live has a very bright glow in the center of screen when we get to the nightscope. And I would presume -- and help me here, John -- that that means that there's something burning, and burning rather brightly and largely. I don't think there are any lights on during the evening there, are there?

VAUSE: No, what's been happening is that when these air strikes happen the Taliban have been cutting power to the city, plunging the city into darkness, trying to make it harder for the pilots to find their targets.

But yes, when you see that bright glowing on the horizon, yes, that's usually an indication of something burning or some kind of missile, or possibly even antiaircraft tracer fire going up into the distance.

But I can't see that just at the moment. But I understand that what you're talking about is a fairly bright glow on the horizon. What they have been trying to hit is military targets. They could have hit an ammunition dump. In the past we know that they have hit fuel depots as well. It's very difficult to read these pictures; you can make all sorts of assumptions. But until you can actually get there on the ground, like we have people on the ground who go out and try and find out just what's been hit.

It's very difficult to try and read into these pictures just what's happening, apart from making generalizations; apart from the fact that an air strike is underway and that something, as you say, is burning, and something's been hit.

FRAZIER: Well, from Islamabad, John Vause. John, thank you very much for bringing us up to date.

One of the people John referenced there, the people on the ground in Afghanistan, is our own Nic Robertson. And he can he help us now with that claim made by the Taliban that hundreds of civilians were killed in the U.S. air strike last week. Today the Taliban took a number of journalists around, gave them a tour of a village in eastern Afghanistan near Jalalabad. Nic was among them.

Nic Robertson now tells us what he has seen.

(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)

NIC ROBERTSON, CNN CORRESPONDENT: One of Taliban's top leaders said this evening that he believed were weakened to this conflict (ph) that the people of Afghanistan were behind the Taliban regime. Now, they were concerned in the early days of the air bombardment: Which way would public opinion inside Afghanistan go -- would it go with the Taliban, or would it go against them? Now the government here saying that it has gone with them.

Now, the Taliban today took us to a village about 60 miles west of Jalalabad, where we are now. In that village, they showed us houses that they say had been destroyed in a bombing raid. It was a village, remote, high in the mountain, difficult to get to. There were about 40 to 50 houses there and about 90 percent of them were destroyed.

People were sifting through the rubble there. They said that they were trying to find loved ones, trying to find property in those houses. People there told us this was just a simple, rural community. They bridled at suggestions this might have been a terrorist training camp or might have been viewed as a terrorist training camp. They insisted that it was just a rural community. They showed us bomb fragments they said were from American bombs. And, indeed, just 100 yards from the village, a large unexploded bomb stuck in the hillside.

Later on the Taliban took us to a hospital in Jalalabad where we saw about 17 people who were injured in that same bomb blast in that same village, we are told.

Now, the Taliban said that some 200 people were killed in that blast. We had no independent verification of that. Certainly, in the village itself there were some, perhaps two dozen of so graves. But in the hospital, again, we spoke to survivors and they talked about airplanes dropping bombs early in the morning. They talked about losing large numbers of loved ones from their families.

One man told us he'd lost four of his children, another said he'd lost his wife; and another two children we saw in the hospital, doctors there told us that they were orphans. The doctors told us that when the casualties first came in there was a big flood of some 28 casuals. Three died; some have subsequently been discharged, but there are 17 still there.

The Taliban have also taken us to sights that we've asked to go to. We asked to go to the airfield, knowing that this had been a site subject to air attacks. Now, we were shown an radar installation that had been hit, the Taliban said, by a cruise missile on the first night of attacks. The airport commander there told us that the airport was now not operating. He said that there no communications at the airport, that the runway was slightly damaged but they didn't have any plane that they were able to use from the runway. And for right now he said the airport was out of action.

On the streets we've also been able to get an insight into life here in the city of Jalalabad. Some stores are closed. We have seen a few people leaving town today. But the vast majority of stores here are open. There are people out on the streets going about their business as normal. We saw a lady this morning walking down the road carrying a box of washing powder.

A lot of traffic on the road, too. There appears to be no problem at the fuel stations for people getting fuel. People have been able to drive in and fuel up vehicles at will.

So the situation out on the streets here, perhaps fewer people around than would be normal; but a sense of normality, not a sense of abject fear on the streets at this time.

Nic Robertson, CNN, Jalalabad, Afghanistan.

(END VIDEOTAPE)

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