Rumsfeld: War will be 'long and difficult'

Last night's strikes against Afghanistan were today hailed as "successful" by the US, but will continue for days or longer before a significant let-up.

In overnight raids, US and British forces hit targets in at least three cities - Kabul, Kandahar and Jalalabad.

Describing the attacks as "very successful", the US defence secretary, Donald Rumsfeld, stressed that killing or capturing Osama bin Laden would not mean victory and that Washington's declared war on terrorism would be long and difficult.

Earlier, Jack Straw, the foreign secretary, said military action is likely to continue for weeks.

"We are certainly not talking days, unless something absolutely dramatic happens," he said.

In the first casualty reports to emerge from Afghanistan, the Taliban ambassador to Pakistan, Abdul Salam Zaeef, said 20 civilians had been killed, including women, children and elderly people.

In a sometimes chaotic press conference, Mr Zaeef claimed that one plane was shot down, with unconfirmed reports that three others had also been downed.

The Pentagon said no planes had been lost.

In a defiant performance, Mr Zaeef denounced the raids as a "terrorist attack on all the Muslim world".

Taliban officials said two people were also killed and at least four injured in three air raids on the fundamentalist movement's southern stronghold of Kandahar.

George Robertson, the Nato secretary general, announced that the alliance had agreed to send five Awacs surveillance aircraft to the US for counter-terrorism operations there, to free up American Awacs for operations in Afghanistan.

"The campaign to eradicate terrorism has reached a new stage," Mr Robertson said, as he expressed Nato's full support for the US and Britain.

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