Bush rejects Taliban's offer on Osama

By B. Muralidhar Reddy

ISLAMABAD, OCT. 14. The Deputy Prime Minister of the Taliban, Mr. Haji Abdul Kabir, tonight made a conditional offer to the U.S. for handing over Osama bin Laden to a ``third country'' if the U.S. was prepared to provide the necessary evidence about involvement of Osama or any of his associates in the September 11 attacks.

Mr. Kabir told a group of reporters in Jalalabad that the Taliban was ready to discuss the offer in case the U.S. was ready to stop the air strikes. If evidence of Osama's involvement was given and the bombing campaign stopped, Mr. Kabir said, ``we would be ready to hand him over to a third country''. He added that the third country should be the one that would never ``come under pressure from the U.S.''

``If the U.S. was to step back from the current policy, then we could negotiate. Then we could discuss which the third country could be,'' he said.

The offer came a day after the Taliban rejected a ``second chance'' given by Mr. Bush for the militia to surrender Osama.

In the real sense there is nothing new in the offer made by the Taliban leader. Right from day one after the September 11 attacks and the U.S. suspicions about involvement of Osama, the Taliban has been demanding evidence.

Even before the September 11 incidents, the Taliban has been asking the international community to provide it the necessary evidence to consider the demand for hand over of Osama as required by the United Nations Security Council Resolutions of December 1999 and December 2000.Sridhar Krishnaswami reports from Washington:

The U.S. has quickly rejected the Taliban's offer to hand over Osama to a third country if the bombings are halted. ``The President has been very clear there will be no negotiations,'' a White House spokesperson, Ms. Anne Womack, said.

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