TALIBAN militias used helicopters, tanks and artillery in a show of force at the mouth of the Panjshir Valley yesterday despite a warning from the Afghan warlord, Gen Dostam, that he might join forces against them unless they called a ceasefire.
Taliban sappers were detonating explosives to blast away rocks which forces of the ousted defence minister, Gen Ahmed Shah Massoud, had placed on the road last week to block their path. Scores of fresh troops were arriving at the front line village of Gulbahar in apparent readiness to push farther up the valley after their initial advance last Friday.
"We plan to go forward," said Mr Fazil Bary, who commands 35 men, as he sat in his Toyota Landcruiser drinking tea. Asked if he knew the Panjsher valley was the graveyard for hundreds of Soviet troops during several abortive campaigns to seize it, he laughed: "We have the power of the Koran behind us.
An hour later, some of his men were starting the ascent of a mountainside which controls the mouth of the gorge to reinforce other Taliban who occupied it at the weekend. Mortars and tank rounds were fired over the mountains towards Massoud positions.
The super confident militias were happy to chat to reporters as new troops drove up. Mr Abdul Ghazi (25) bad a bandage above his left eye over a wound from a piece of shrapnel which hit him on Saturday. He was determined to fight on, he said. Another man had defected from Massoud's forces when he saw them fleeing from Kabul 10 days earlier as the Taliban seized the city.
While Gen Massoud is the Talibans' immediate target, mystery is growing round Gen Dostam's intentions. He commands the Salang tunnel, the main link with northern Afghanistan, and broke with Gen Massoud three years ago.
A statement from his headquarters in Mazar i Sharif warned the Taliban that to go on fighting serves no purpose" and called for a broadly based Islamic government.