The Times Of India is reporting the following story, which may mark the beginning of the end of the Taliban in the City of Kunduz in Northern
Afghanistan:

[size=4]Oppn says Taliban surrendering in Kunduz[/size=4]

KABUL: The Taliban began evacuating their northern foothold of Kunduz on Saturday, with some 2,000 soldiers surrendering to opposing Northern Alliance forces, a spokesman said.

"The evacuation of Kunduz started this (Saturday) morning at 11am (0630 GMT) and so far 1,000 Taliban have laid down their weapons and surrendered" to Northern Alliance commanders to the northwest, said Mohammad Habeel, a spokesman for alliance military chief General Mohammad Qasim Fahim.

He said another 700 Afghan Taliban fighters surrendered to commander Mohammad Daoud Daoud to the east.

Six hundred foreign fighters believed loyal to Osama Bin Laden have also handed over their weapons Saturday to the the Alliance while others remained in the city ready to fight to the death.

Amid the chaotic scene around the besieged city of Kunduz, the Taliban's last northern stronghold, it was impossible to know how many foreigners remained inside the city.

There was no way to verify independently the figure for the number of foreigners said to have surrendered.

Alliance commanders characterized the surrender of the foreigners - and the separate defections of at least 100 Afghan Taliban - as the beginning of a wholesale surrender. They made clear, however, that their fighters would enter Kunduz whether its defenders are ready to give up or not.

The foreign fighters surrendered in the village of Qalai Qul Mohammed, west of Kunduz, after breaking through Alliance front lines, alliance commanders said.

"The 600 foreign fighters, who are Chechens, Arabs, and some Pakistanis, surrendered with their weapons," said Amanullah Khan, a northern alliance spokesman.

Forces of the three main generals in northern Afghanistan -Rashid Dostum, Atta Mohammed and Mohammed Mohaqik - took them to the city of Mazar-i-Sharif, he said.

An Alliance commander on the other side of the city, Gen. Daoud Khan, said more surrenders were expected.

"It has just started. Maybe another 700 more will be handed over. We should have all these prisoners handed over in next day or two days," he said, adding: "Maybe tonight or tomorrow we will enter into Kunduz."

The Taliban governor trapped in the city - whose name, like the Taliban supreme leader, is Mohammed Omar - had said Friday night that his fighters would walk out "peacefully and unarmed."

Speaking by satellite telephone from inside Kunduz, he told Britain's Channel 4 television: "The Taliban brothers who are from other provinces of Afghanistan, they have a way out."

- continued -

But it was unclear whether he spoke for the foreign fighters as well, who have no such guarantees for free passage out of Kunduz.

The alliance prepared to move into the city in any case. At the eastern front line Saturday, Khan ordered one of his commanders:

[b]"Bring up the tanks and troops to go into Kunduz. If the foreigners fight you, fight."[/b]

Dostum also moved at least eight tanks, rocket launchers and some troops to the eastern front line to support Khan's men.

Some of the defectors from inside the city also kept their weapons and joined the Northern Alliance lines, preparing to attack the foreigners who had lived with them inside the former Taliban stronghold.

"We have given up to the Northern Alliance. They are our brothers and sisters," said Shah Mahmoud. "The foreigners will never surrender, I think."

Under a deal negotiated between the Alliance and the Taliban in recent days, the foreign fighters are to be put in detention camps pending an investigation into their links to Bin Laden's Al-Qaida terrorist network.

Gen. Khan said the foreigners would be tried in "Islamic courts" in Afghanistan.

But many feared the Alliance fighters, whose hatred of the foreigner fighters is intense, would slaughter them rather than send them to trial.

An American official in Washington said some of the fighters in the besieged city may be deputies and lieutenants to Bin Laden, the chief suspect in the September 11 terrorist attacks which sparked the US-led attacks on the Taliban.

Meanwhile, rebellious Pashtun tribal forces have captured a town near the Taliban militia's southern Afghanistan base of Kandahar, cutting the main road to Pakistan, tribal elder Hamid Karzai told AFP Saturday.

Former deputy foreign minister and Pashtun tribal leader Karzai said local tribal militia had attacked the Taliban on Friday around Takhtapul, some 45 kilometres southeast of Kandahar.

"People rose up against the Taliban and liberated the area. The Taliban tried to counter attack and re-take the area but they couldn't," Karzai said via satellite phone from southern Afghanistan.

See article at:[url]http://timesofindia.indiatimes.com/articleshow.asp?art_id=555684054[/url]

Eric The(BackFromShreveport)Hun[>]:)]

Too bad. I was hoping the Taliban and foreigners would stay and fight and die.

Oohrah.  What happened to that He-Man, fight-to-the-death 69-Virgins rhetoric?

They don't even believe it. [flame]

Heck, they are not uniformed army so execute them.

Kill em all. Screw this surrender and join the Nortern Alliance...

Kill em now!!!
[50]

bin Ladens people surrendered yesterday. Today they attempted a breakout from their holding pen at Mazur e Sherif (supposedly). Some US Military personal were briefly trapped in buildings near the airfield. US Navy airstrikes were called on the compound and then NA troops counterattacked with tanks.  "At least" 500 Al Quiada fighters were killed in suppressing the fighting.

[url]http://dailynews.yahoo.com/h/ap/20011125/wl/attacks_afghanistan_uprising_7.html[/url]
[url]http://news.bbc.co.uk/hi/english/world/south_asia/newsid_1675000/1675769.stm[/url]
[url]http://dailynews.yahoo.com/h/ap/20011125/ts/attacks_military_286.html[/url]

No more special favorites for Arab, Chechian, and Paki prisoners from now on OK?  They keep doing this they might hurt one of our GI's.

[url]http://www.cnn.com/2001/WORLD/asiapcf/central/11/25/ret.afghan.konduz/index.html[/url]

Gees binLadens people have killed more NA troops while in the act of SURRENDERING than they did in combat! They are kind of like the Japanese in WWII it seems.

Which means we should treat them accordingly.