US Captures Big Afghan Arms Cache - Detain Seven

Reuters/Yahoo ^ | 9-19-2002

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U.S. Captures Big Afghan Arms Cache, Detain Seven

Thu Sep 19, 7:39 AM ET

BAGRAM, Afghanistan (Reuters) - U.S. special forces have captured seven men suspected of being Taliban fighters and truckloads of weapons in an operation near the border with Pakistan, the U.S. military said on Thursday.

The arms found at Orgun-e, about 109 miles south of Kabul on Wednesday filled three trucks and included rockets, mines and two anti-aircraft guns, U.S. military spokesman Colonel Roger King said. He called it "a significant haul."

"The anti-aircraft weapons are probably particularly significant in that we do a lot of movement by air," King said from Bagram Air Base, just north of Kabul, headquarters of U.S. forces in Afghanistan.

King said about a dozen U.S. special forces soldiers took part in the mission and they would usually be accompanied by up to 50 Afghan fighters. He said the Taliban suspects were being held by the Afghan military.

He said the soldiers had found literature in the compound where the men were found calling for a "jihad" -- or holy war -- against coalition and U.S. forces in Afghanistan.

U.S. and allied forces are in Afghanistan searching for remnants of the Taliban regime overthrown last year and their al Qaeda allies blamed for the attacks on New York and Washington last year.

King said there had been no new security procedures put in place as a result of the discovery in Kabul at the weekend of a fuel truck laden with explosives with papers indicating it was destined for Bagram.

"We already have what we consider to be the right procedures in place to protect us from people trying to plant improvised explosive devices on vehicles seeking to gain access to the post," he said.

However some changes that were already planned before the discovery of the truck, would be made, he said.

These would include a pipeline to off-base storage containers so that commercial fuel trucks never had to enter Bagram, which is home to several thousand U.S. personnel.

"It's almost finished," King said.