Troops question Afghans captured in weapons raid
Eight Afghans were today being questioned by international troops after British Royal Marines raided a compound in south-eastern Afghanistan and seized a huge stash of weapons which may have been left by al Qaida and Taliban fighters.
The arsenal rooms stacked high with hundreds of mortars, rockets and heavy weapons - was among the largest found by international troops who have been searching for weeks in Afghanistan’s border region with Pakistan. Few al Qaida or Taliban fighters have been found, but several stores of weapons have been uncovered.
More than 10 men, some in camouflage fatigues, were detained in the compound during the raid, marines said. Eight were brought to the military interrogation centre at Bagram airbase, the centre of operations for the thousands of international forces in Afghanistan.
The raid took place on Saturday, a few days before Gen Tommy Franks, the commander of US forces in Afghanistan, was due to visit Bagram and be briefed on operations including the hunt for al Qaida and Taliban hideouts. Franks was holding talks with Pakistani officials in Islamabad today before travelling to Bagram, officials said.
Yesterday Afghan president Hamid Karzai said that individuals or small pockets of al Qaida and Taliban fighters might still exist in Afghanistan and be capable of ‘‘terroristic activities’’.
But he said they posed no threat to his government.
‘‘They are a defeated force,’’ Karzai told CNN from the Afghan capital, Kabul. ‘‘They are on the run. They are hiding and we are after them. In those terms they are not a threat at all to the government.’’
The Marines chanced on the weapons stockpile after spotting a large antenna on top of a building in the village of Surwipan. The soldiers broke through a stone wall to enter the compound after people inside tried to lock them out.
Inside, they found rooms filled with weapons and boxes of ammunition. The haul included hundreds of large mortar rounds and rockets, thousands of recoilless rocket rounds and 65,000 rounds of small arms ammunition.
Also found were stacks of rocket and mortar launchers, several anti-aircraft machine guns, several boxes of plastic explosives with detonators and other equipment for making bombs and booby traps.
The haul was far larger than the weaponry that villages often have for their defence and ‘‘may belong to the al Qaida or Taliban,’’ said Maj Richard Stephens, the group’s commander.
