= US B-52s BOMB KUNDUZ *
= MULLAH OMAR FLEES KNDAHAR?
= (ICRC) SAYS UP TO 600 BODIES IN MAZAR-I-SHARIF TWO WEEKS AFTER IT WAS CAPTURED BY THE NORTHERN ALLIANCE
= BRITAIN & PAKISTAN EXPRESS CONCERN OF A BLOODBATH IN KUNDUZ
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KABUL/BANGI (Reuters) - Afghanistan's Northern Alliance said on Friday it suspended an assault on the besieged city of Kunduz to give the Taliban more time to surrender, but would resume attacks if no deal emerged by Saturday afternoon.Despite the pause in ground attacks, U.S. warplanes kept up their aerial barrage, bombing Taliban targets around Kunduz on the 48th day of attacks on theTaliban to punish them for harboring Saudi-born fugitive Osama bin Laden.
A Reuters television crew near Taloqan, east of Kunduz, saw American B-52s flying overhead and then heard bombs exploding in the direction of the city, sending plumes of smoke into the sky.
Northern Alliance Foreign Minister Abdullah Abdullah told Reuters he hoped negotiations with the fighters in Kunduz, the Taliban's last northern bastion, would work, but the attack would go on if no deal materialized.
``We have given them more time, until tomorrow afternoon. Otherwise, if there isn't a result after these negotiations, the fighting will resume,'' he said.
And in the south, in a sign of mounting pressure, a Taliban official said their supreme leader, Mullah Mohammad Omar, had fled his stronghold in the city of Kandahar for a more secure hideaway, leaving a deputy in his place.
``Mullah Omar has shifted to an unknown place for security reasons,'' Mullah Sayed Mohammad Haqqani, a Taliban security official in charge at the border town of Spin Boldak near Pakistan, told Reuters.
But the Afghan Islamic Press (AIP) later quoted Mullah Omar's spokesman as saying the report was false.
FEARS OF BLOODBATH
Fears grew on Friday Kunduz could become a bloodbath if the surrender talks foundered or if the thousands of al Qaeda troops fought to the death to avoid the risk of summary justice.
British Foreign Secretary Jack Straw said Pakistani President Pervez Musharraf expressed serious concern at a meeting in Islamabad about the fate of the Kunduz defenders.
``We're working hard to see if it's possible to avoid a massacre,'' Straw told reporters on his aircraft as he flew back to London. ``It means getting a much clearer assessment of the situation and finding out if it is possible to get a surrender.''
Foreign fighters' fears of retribution will not have been allayed by the International Committee of the Red Cross (ICRC), which said up to 600 bodies had been found in the city of Mazar-i-Sharif after its capture two weeks ago by the Alliance.
Despite the fierce Taliban defense of Kunduz, the chief target for the U.S.-led coalition is Kandahar, where the bulk of the Taliban's forces are massed after their swift rout by the Northern Alliance from most of the rest of the country.
Around 700 followers of two anti-Taliban Pashtun leaders have assembled inside Afghanistan preparing for what they called an assault on Kandahar soon.
Local residents said they saw helicopters, possibly American, supplying arms and warm clothing to the fighters, who were lodged in about 60-70 tents.