Taliban Militia

Seeking to draw attention to the treatment of women and children in Afghanistan, the White House assigned President Bush's weekly Saturday radio address to First Lady Laura Bush, who said the war on terrorism was "a fight for the rights and dignity of women."

The fundamentalist Islamic Taliban militia recaptured two strategic towns north of the capital, Kabul, in a major offensive, Taliban officials and a local news service reported. But the militia continued to face shelling from opposition forces still occupying hills near the towns of Golbahar and Jabal os Saraj, a Pakistan-based Afghan news service said.

While reading your Nov. 23 article on the Taliban militia and its enforcement of a female dress code, it occurred to me that subservience can be attained in various ways--the forced wearing of the burka in the case of the Afghan women or the sexual harassment and rape of women by the U.S. military. The result is the same--control and domination. This country is not as civilized as it would like to believe. TOM TOMASELLE Santa Ynez

A group of 26 Iranian truck drivers released by Afghanistan's Taliban militia arrived in Tehran, the official news agency IRNA reported. Most of the men had been arrested by the militia when it seized the northern Afghan city of Mazar-i-Sharif in August. The Taliban had promised to release Iranian prisoners when U.N. envoy Lakhdar Brahimi met with the militia's supreme leader, Mullah Mohammed Omar, on Wednesday in a bid to ease tension between the Sunni Muslim Taliban and mainly Shiite Iran.

U.S. and Afghan troops arrested 26 Afghan security officers manning a highway checkpoint who were suspected of having links to the Taliban militia, an Afghan official said. The arrests were made in the Shahjoy district of the southern province of Zabol, Police Chief Thor Jan said.

Afghanistan's warring factions began peace talks in Tehran, but the Taliban militia, which controls two-thirds of Afghanistan, boycotted them. The Taliban objected to Iranian interference in Afghan affairs and said there was no chance of a cease-fire, said Mohammed Rabbani, head of the Taliban council running the Afghan capital, Kabul.

The ruling Taliban militia, backed by artillery and attack helicopters, launched a major offensive to recapture a key central town that opposition forces seized in a surprise attack last week. The Taliban-run Bakhtar news agency cited an unidentified commander as saying the Taliban forces had succeeded in taking Yakaolang, about 130 miles west of the Afghan capital, Kabul, after intense fighting.

Afghanistan's ruling Taliban militia closed the office of a U.S.-based relief organization and arrested 24 of its workers, accusing them of propagating Christianity, a Taliban-run news agency reported. Shelter Now International is a Christian relief agency based in Oshkosh, Wis., that provides food, tents and blankets to poor Afghans. Its Afghan office was sealed following a raid by the Taliban's vice squad, witnesses said.

Islamic clerics and judges have begun a "deliberation" ahead of the trial of eight foreign aid workers accused of promoting Christianity, the chief justice of Afghanistan's ruling Taliban militia said, adding that the trial could begin later today. Chief Justice Noor Mohammed Saqib said the accused would have a chance to defend themselves. Twenty-four staff members from the German-based relief agency Shelter Now International, including two Americans, were arrested last month.

The United Nations is returning some of its international staff to Afghanistan after a seven-month absence sparked by the killings of three U.N. staffers in July and August. The top U.N. humanitarian coordinator, Sergio Vieira de Mello, cited progress by Afghanistan's Taliban militia in investigating the killings, as well as evidence of Taliban efforts to address U.N. security concerns.