US forces followed up their first ground attack in Afghanistan with more air raids today on Taliban targets as a refugee exodus from the stricken country gathered pace.
The United States also reported two deaths after a US helicopter crashed at a Pakistani airfield near the Afghan border hours after the ground raids. US President George W. Bush insisted however that the war against the Taliban was making "great progress".
Ground operations started last night when US army Rangers raided an airbase outside Kandahar and a compound of the Taliban's supreme leader Mullah Mohammad Omar, the US Defence Department said. The Taliban said it repulsed the attack.
"The raid involved between 100 and 200 army Rangers and other special forces," Mr Richard Myers, chairman of the US Joint Chiefs of Staff, said in Washington.
It was the first ground combat inside Afghanistan since US and British planes started strikes against the Taliban and Osama bin Laden's al-Qaeda network on October 7th.
Two soldiers were said to have been injured parachuting into the base. But by early this morning, the assault troops had been ferried by helicopter out of Afghanistan, US military sources said.
The Taliban, however, said it confronted the US commandos and forced them to retreat.
The head of the Taliban information agency Abdul Hanan Hemat said: "The forces of the Islamic Emirate (Taliban) went to the area and the US troops were forced to leave a short while after they had landed."
US warplanes hit Taliban frontline positions today in the northern province of Samangan, opposition spokesman Mohammad Ashraf Nadeem said from Samangan.
As the US air campaign went into a 14th day, warplanes also hit Kabul again this morning. "The planes dropped six bombs one after the other," a resident of northern Kabul said.
This evening, Taliban guns again opened fire over Kabul and the sound of helicopter-type aircraft could be heard flying over the capital.
The US attacks further increased the rush to escape Afghanistan.
Up to 5,000 refugees crossed into Pakistan at the Chaman border post today, in another increase in numbers fleeing US bombardments, the United Nations said.
Ten thousand more people were stranded on the Afghan side, unable to cross because they did not have valid travel documents, UN High Commissioner for Refugees (UNHCR) spokesman Mr Peter Kessler said in Islamabad.
The United Nations also said its operations in Afghanistan were being undermined by growing lawlessness with aid agency staff being attacked and equipment looted.
AFP