Taliban Forces Wage Counteroffensive

While Taliban negotiators talked with Afghanistan’s northern warlord, Taliban fighters waged a blistering counterattack against the deposed government’s troops outside the capital, Kabul. The Taliban claimed to have pushed the troops out of rocket range of the military base at Bagram, 30 miles north of the capital. The report could not be confirmed. Taliban forces also rejected an offer issued by ousted Deputy Foreign Minister Abdur Rahim Ghafourzai, who told the U.N. Security Council that the deposed government’s soldiers would stop fighting if the Taliban withdrew from Kabul.