Taliban offers to negotiate over Bin Laden
Afghanistan’s ruling Taliban regime tonight offered to negotiate about handing over Osama bin Laden - but rejected Prime Minister Tony Blair’s warning to surrender him ‘‘or surrender power’’.
The ultra-fundamentalist regime’s ambassador to Pakistan said the suspected terrorist mastermind’s handover was open to negotiation but he demanded proof or evidence of his involvement in the attacks on America of September 11.
And the ambassador, Abdul Salaam Zaeef, had this message for Mr Blair: ‘‘Only Allah can change regimes.’’
Mr Blair’s stern warning to the Taliban came at today’s Labour Party conference, when in the strongest words yet, he said: ‘‘I say to the Taliban - surrender the terrorists or surrender power. It’s your choice.’’
But Mr Zaeef, speaking in Quetta, Pakistan, said: ‘‘Allah only changes the regime and only Allah brings the other regimes.’’
The ambassador is the only spokesman for the Taliban outside Afghanistan, where the ultra-fundamentalist Islamic regime controls most of the country.
Today he said they would negotiate over the fate of bin Laden, who has been named as prime suspect for masterminding the kamikaze hijackings of September 11.
‘‘We call all the people, all the countries, to come to negotiation, to come to peace,’’ he said.
‘‘We are happy to help with any action which is for the peace. We are ready for peaceful negotiation.
‘‘We want justice. We do not want surrender without any proof, any evidence. Where is the evidence, where is the proof?’’
