Tora Bora may be last al-Qaida stronghold

Osama bin Laden may be bottled-up with his forces in the Tora Bora region said US officials.

The Pentagon also conceded that he could be elsewhere in Afghanistan.

The US Defence Secretary, Donald Rumsfeld, said the Pentagon believes bin Laden is still in Afghanistan, though he acknowledged there were reports he had left the country.

He said they were getting ‘‘scraps of information’’ about bin Laden from Afghans, Pakistanis and others.

‘‘He is in hiding. We are asking everyone to help.’’

As US planes strafed and bombed al-Qaida positions yesterday, Afghan tribesmen and US special forces advanced against bin Laden’s fighters in a snowy mountain canyon.

They vowed to wipe them out after surrender negotiations fell through.

The US has sent more special operations forces into the Tora Bora region, where they could engage in direct combat with al Qaida fighters.

Intense bombing and advances by US commandos and anti-Taliban rebels have reduced substantially the area in which bin Laden and his forces can operate safely within the cave-dotted mountains near Tora Bora, US officials said.

Commanders in the tribal Eastern Alliance said top terrorists who they believed were among the al-Qaida forces may have escaped toward the nearby border with Pakistan.

Heavy snow fell around the Tora Bora area in Afghanistan’s eastern White Mountains, making escape more difficult for the Arab and foreign Muslim fighters trapped for days in a heavily forested canyon after fleeing al-Qaida caves.

After nightfall yesterday, B-52 bombers carpet-bombed the higher mountain ridges near the Pakistani border, creating spectacular orange flashes in the night.

An AC-130 gunship resumed attacks for the third night in a row.

If not for the surrender talks over the past two days, ‘‘this would have been finished,’’ Hazrat Ali, security chief for the alliance, said.

‘‘Now we will fight them until we annihilate them.’’

Ali said he was not sure if bin Laden was trapped with his men in Tora Bora or even in the area at all.

The Pentagon has said Tora Bora - a network of caves and tunnels in the White Mountains - is the last effective al-Qaida stronghold in Afghanistan.

Ali said surrender offers by the al-Qaida fighters holed up in Tora Bora had been ‘‘a trick’’ to give senior leaders a chance to escape.

He said he thought about 700 al-Qaida fighters, along with at least some of the leaders, remained in the Tora Bora area.

Pakistan has said it has reinforced the border, just a few miles south of the fighting, with helicopters and thousands of soldiers.

Aslam Khan, a Pakistani soldier in the area, said: ‘‘We are monitoring the border round the clock’’.

Fiery explosions echoed down the Milawa valley, mixed with heavy machine gun and tank fire.

Before dawn yesterday, US planes dropped at least one 15,000lbs ‘‘daisy cutter’’ bomb.

Alliance fighters on the front lines said at least 60 US special forces troops were with them, calling in air strikes and advising alliance commanders.

There were also reports of British special forces operating in the area.

The Pentagon says US forces in the area are not entering direct combat.