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Rival warlords sign truce Original Source Link: (May no longer be active)
http://abcnews.go.com/wire/World/ap20031010_157.htmlhttp://abcnews.go.com/wire/World/ap20031010_157.html
Rival Warlords Sign Truce in Afghanistan
Militiamen Relax After Rival Warlords Sign Truce Following Fighting That Reportedly Killed Dozens
The Associated Press
CHAR GUMBAZ, Afghanistan Oct. 10 — Soldiers lounged on their tanks sipping tea in the sunshine and listening to the radio on Friday, a day after rival warlords reached a truce following battles that killed dozens of people in northern Afghanistan.
There were no reports of new clashes following the cease-fire, which was signed late Thursday after the bloodiest fighting in northern Afghanistan in months. Soldiers and residents expressed hope that the deal would stick after a string of earlier truces signed over the past two years fell apart.
"We are all very happy the fighting has stopped," said Hashim Khan, a commander for warlord Atta Mohammed, as he sat in the middle of a cotton field, the site of pitched battles hours earlier, near Char Gumbaz village.
"Now is the time in Afghanistan for reconstruction and peace. It is not the time for fighting. This has been very bad. My side will never be the first to break the cease-fire, never."
About two miles away across the field were the tanks and artillery of rival warlord Abdul Rashid Dostum. They were quiet.
Under the terms of the truce, both sides are supposed to move their weaponry 18 miles back from the front line before Saturday and then return them to their bases.
Khan said he had not been ordered to move back.
On the other side, Dostum's commander, Mohammad Nabi, said he had just been told to withdraw from the battlefield. He called out to some 100 soldiers around him to back up and prepare to go.
Much of the fighting has occurred about 12 miles west of Mazar-e-Sharif, home to 1.5 million people and scene of some of the bloodiest battles in the U.S.-led war to oust Afghanistan's former Taliban regime.
The United Nations said the fighting that began Wednesday resulted in a "high numbers of casualties," but did not have precise figures. Though one side said more than 60 died, the other said it was fewer.
A spokesman for the U.N. mission in Afghanistan, Manoel de Almeida e Silva, said the conflict was "very intense," with both sides using tanks and mortars.
It was not immediately clear what sparked the fighting. A government spokesman in Kabul said it was most likely due to disputes over land or access to water, the cause of repeated clashes in the past two years.
Both warring sides are members of the Northern Alliance, which helped U.S.-led forces oust the Taliban in late 2001. The loose coalition of warlords is split along factional and ethnic lines. Both warlords are nominally loyal to President Hamid Karzai.
In Cod-e-bar civilian hospital in Mazar-e-Sharif, a handful of people were being treated for wounds from the fighting. A 12-year-old boy, who only gave his name as Abdullah, was lying in bed, after one of his legs was amputated and his neck bandaged after a tank round slammed into the ground near his family's hut.
"This fighting is terrible. Why has the international community not stopped this. Please stop this fighting," he cried.
There are about 5,500 NATO-led peacekeepers in Afghanistan, but they are restricted to Kabul. NATO has drawn up plans to expand the force to other cities, including Mazar-e-Sharif.
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