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US planes have dropped leaflets in southern Afghanistan offering up to $US5 million for help in tracking down elusive leaders of the former Taliban regime and their al Qaeda allies, Afghan traders said.
Blue leaflets the size of dollar bills had been scattered by US aircraft over the provinces of Helmand, Uruzgan and the Taliban's onetime stronghold of Kandahar, the traders said, as they arrived in the Pakistani border town of Chaman.
"A reward of up to five million dollars will be given for authentic information, that could lead to the arrest of Taliban and al Qaeda leaders or their hideouts," the leaflets said, written in the local Pashto and Dari languages.
They bore two photographs of the Taliban's top leader Mullah Mohammad Omar, who was rarely seen in public during his strict five-year rule over Afghanistan that ended late last year. One of the pictures showed him behind bars.
Witnesses said some of the leaflets were dropped by silent reconnaissance planes on Monday night.
US military aircraft scattered similar leaflets in March, offering rewards for tracking down fugitive Taliban and their al Qaeda allies blamed for the September 11 attacks on the United States.
US forces have conducted major ground operations together with Afghan forces in pursuit of Taliban and a Qaeda remnants.
However, these have failed so far to track down senior figures, including al Qaeda leader Osama bin Laden, who Washington considers the mastermind of the September 11 attacks.
© Reuters
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