Taliban deny staging suicide attack on opposition leader

Calling Ahmed Shah Massood their battlefield enemy, the hard-line Islamic Taliban denied they were behind a suicide bombing that has critically injured the opposition leader.

‘‘We do not say that he was not our enemy, but we had no hand in the bombing. We condemn all terrorist activities,’’ Abdul Rehman Ottaq, a senior foreign ministry official said today.

‘‘He was our direct enemy in the bunkers on the frontline, because we believe he is an enemy of the Islamic emirate of Afghanistan, but we had no hand in this terrorist attack.’’

There were conflicting reports about Massood’s condition, with the Russian news agency Itar/Tass reporting his death.

Analysts say the fragile opposition led by Massood would collapse if he died, and without an obvious successor it is likely the anti-Taliban alliance would want to regroup and plot a strategy before talking extensively about his condition, or death.

His brother, Ahmed Wali, the opposition’s representative in London, said yesterday that Massood’s condition was critical, he had been operated on for shrapnel wounds to the head and had not regained consciousness since the operation the day before.

Wali left Britain late yesterday for Tajikistan, where it is believed Massood has been taken. There were some reports that he was operated upon at a Russian field hospital on the Tajik border with Afghanistan.

There were other reports that he was too badly wounded to be moved from northern Afghanistan.

The suicide bombing occurred on Sunday when two men, believed to be from northern Africa but travelling on Belgian passports, posed as television journalists to get close to Massood.

The bomb was hidden in the television camera. It exploded shortly after the interview held at Massood’s base in northern Takhar province began, according to his spokesman, Abdullah.

The two bombers were killed, as well as a spokesman of Massood’s. Three other people, including Massood, were hurt.

‘‘Massood received the most serious injuries,’’ said Abdullah, who uses one name. He blamed the Taliban and Pakistan, one of only three countries to recognise the Islamic rulers in Afghanistan.

Massood’s northern alliance, called the United Front, is made up of smaller groups largely representing the country’s minority ethnic and religious groups.

Former enemies who fought bitterly against each other when they ruled Kabul between 1992 and 1996, they rallied together under Massood’s charismatic leadership to try to stop the Taliban from gaining full control of the country.

Successive battlefield victories by the Taliban forced Massood’s alliance out of key strongholds and restricted them to pockets of control in the Panjshir Valley and a handful of provinces in northern Afghanistan. Massood is often referred to as the ‘‘Lion of the Panjshir’’.

In the beleaguered capital of Kabul there was sadness at the news of the suicide bombing and the prospect of Massood’s death.

‘‘Even if you don’t support him he was someone who could maybe force the Taliban to soften their attitude toward the people,’’ said Mohammed Idrees, an ethnic Pashtun who operates a small ramshackle shop tucked away in a narrow dusty lane.

Idles belonged to the same ethnic group as most Taliban, who are largely made up of ethnic Pashto’s, the country’s largest ethnic group. Massood was an ethnic Tajik.

Most people were afraid to talk about Massood, looking over their shoulders, moving away quickly as strangers approached, worried the ruling Taliban would be nearby.

‘‘Massood was the only one from the north that was a good man,’’ said Idrees. ‘‘The others in the opposition they are all no good.’’

Several people were disturbed that the would-be assassins, both of whom died in the explosion, were Arab nationals.

The anti-Taliban alliance has been fiercely critical of the Taliban accusing the Islamic militia of sending militant Muslims from Arab countries as well as Pakistan, Chechnya and Uzbekistan to fight his northern alliance.

In recent months eyewitnesses at the Pakistani border with Afghanistan have seen several Taliban helicopters return the bodies of felled guerrilla fighters to Pakistan to be returned to their homes, many in Pakistan’s conservative north-west or Punjab province.