Arab militants from Osama bin Laden's al-Qaeda network have provoked protests from Afghan tribesmen by acting as if they run the country and not the ruling Taliban, said a Taliban commander who fled the situation.
In the eastern city of Jalalabad, the Arabs began ordering Afghans around after the Sept. 11 suicide plane attacks in the US, telling them they were now in control, the tribal chief from the area said.
Malik Sherzad Khan, a Taliban militia commander and Arabic interpreter, said there were now so many Arab and Chechen fundamentalists in Jalalabad to defend the city against a possible US ground attack that he left last Friday for safety in Pakistan.
US bombs have hit empty al-Qaeda bases in the Jalalabad area, he added, but none of about 1,800 militants there from Arab countries, Chechnya, Kashmir, Pakistan and other Muslim areas were killed because they live scattered around the city and move houses every night, he said.
"The Arabs and Chechens are now more powerful than the Taliban," said Khan, who said he had long supported the hardline Islamic movement and proudly showed his license to carry a Kalashnikov to defend them.
"On Monday of last week, the Arabs told World Health Organisation [WHO] workers not to speak English or they would be shot," he recounted.
"The workers contacted the Taliban and we met with the Arab commander for Jalalabad, who told us `now we are the rulers, you are worthless,'" he said.
"We handed in our weapons to the police in protest. Two doctors working with the WHO also resigned in protest when they saw the Arabs' behavior," he said, identifying the two Afghans involved. Western estimates say 10,000 to 13,000 Islamic militants, more than half from Arab states, are in Afghanistan with the Saudi-born militant bin Laden, training for terrorist attacks and now preparing to fight what they call a jihad, or holy war, against the US.
Those who have encountered these Arabs inside Afghanistan, where they first arrived in the 1980s to fight with the mujahidin (holy warriors) against Soviet occupation forces, describe them as tough, zealous and aggressively anti-Western.
They normally live out in the mountains, in isolated training camps, and keep to themselves, said Khan, who said he had visited some camps but refused to reveal their location for security reasons.
"Before the bombing started, there were very few of them in Jalalabad," he said. "But after that, the Taliban brought them in to defend the city.
"So the bombs are hitting empty camps and ammunition dumps. There is a camp near Jalalabad called Melawa Tora Bora, which the mujahidin used and then Osama bin Laden and his friends took over. It was a well-known bin Laden camp.
"When the Americans attacked, not a single person was injured because the camp was empty. No Arabs or Chechens are being killed, only innocent people," Khan said in Pashtun.
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