Wednesday October 10, 2001

A US cruise missile hit a residential area in the Afghan capital of Kabul this morning, killing civilians and destroying houses, the Taliban claimed this morning.

No independent confirmation of the casualties was available. After announcing yesterday that they had achieved air supremacy in Afganistan, US planes struck again this morning at Kabul and at the airport in the Taliban stonghold of Kandahar.

US defence officials said yesterday that they had disabled all but one of the Taliban's airbases and knocked out air defences. That announcement could clear the way for low-flying missions that would target specific Taliban leaders or members of Osama bin Laden's al-Quaida terrorist network.

This morning the Taliban said that in response to the US bombing raids, they had lifted all restrictions on Bin Laden and were urging him to wage a holy war on the US.

A Taliban spokesman, Abdul Hai Mutmaen, told the BBC's Pashtu service: "Jihad is an obligation on all Muslims of the world. We want this, Bin Laden wants this and America will face the unpleasant consequences of their attacks."

The Taliban also announced today that Afghans were burning the packets of food dropped from American planes.

Abdul Hanan Himat, a spokesman for the Taliban information ministry, said that because "the Americans are killing us and attacking us, and we don't need this food".

Blair in Gulf

Meanwhile the prime minister, Tony Blair, arrived in the Gulf state of Oman today to meet British soldiers on exercise there and to try to win over sceptical Arab opinion to the war on terrorism.

Mr Blair, who has given military support to the US strikes on Afghanistan, was due to address soldiers taking part in Britain's biggest troop deployment since the 1991 Gulf war.

He was also expected to hold talks with Oman's Sultan Qaboos on the second leg of a diplomatic tour aimed at shoring up Arab support for the military action against the Taliban and Bin Laden's al Qaida organisation.