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09/11/2004:

"Taliban Say Attack Shows They Can Strike at Will"

KABUL (Reuters) - A rocket attack aimed at Kabul's international airport showed the Taliban have the ability to target anywhere in Afghanistan, the group said on Friday, warning the Americans the country would become their ``burial ground.''

Although the four rockets fell well short or wide of their target, Mullah Dadullah Akhund -- the Taliban's military commander and a member of its 10-member ruling council -- said U.S.-led forces in the country were pinned down in their bases.

He was speaking a day after the Arabic satellite TV channel al Jazeera broadcast a video of Osama bin Laden's Egyptian-born deputy, Ayman al-Zawahri, claiming that mujahideen fighters had U.S. forces pinned down in Afghanistan and Iraq.

``The enemy are limited to their capitals,'' al-Zawahri said in the tape, broadcast two days before the third anniversary of the Sept. 11 attacks on the United States. Washington quickly blamed al Qaeda and sent troops to Afghanistan to overthrow the Taliban.

``The Americans are hiding in their trenches and refuse to come out to face the mujahideen, as the mujahideen shell and fire on them, and cut roads off around them. Their defense is only to bomb by air, wasting U.S. money as they kick up dust.''

Full Article: NY Times