KABUL, Sept. 16 (Xinhuanet) -- Kabul fell to US-led coalition nearly 2 years ago, but the ousted Talibans are again active along southern border.

　　In August, the Talibans, who were driven out of Kabul under withering US bombardment and ground assault, assembled some 1,000 troops in the two tribal provinces of Zubul and Kandarhar in southAfghanistan, to launch attacks on US and Afghan forces.

　　Recruits, arms, money and logistical support from Pakistan's two provinces of North West Frontier (NWFP) and Baluchistan, wherePashtun tribesmen and Islamic parties are sympathetic to the Taliban, have fueled the Taliban's dramatic offensive. Pakistan's Pashtuns find common ethnic and political cause with the Taliban, who are also largely Pashtun. Pashtuns on both sides of the borderare bitterly opposed to the presence of US forces in Pakistan and Afghanistan.

　　These days the border area is filled with Taliban in both Afghanistan and Pakistan. The views of the residents were changed soon. "The Taliban are clean, honest, believe in Islam, and will rout the Americans," says Shakirullah, a Mohmand shopkeeper. "Anyone fighting the Americans is our friend," he adds.

　　Most tribes also believe that the Americans and, in particular,President George W. Bush, hate the Pashtuns.

　　After the defeat of the Taliban in Afghanistan, the Pakistan army entered NWFP one by one at the request of US forces, which are patrolling the Afghan side of the border looking for Al-Qaeda militants and the Taliban remnants. In August, at the behest of the Americans, thousands of Pakistani troops occupied the Mohmand area for the first time. But the army has been unable to stop the flow of guns and fighters to the Taliban. For the first time sincetheir defeat nearly two years ago, the Taliban battling US and Afghan government troops in southern Afghanistan are not retreating under withering air bombardment by the Americans. Instead, they are standing their ground and bringing in more recruits from Pakistan, while at the same time trying to open up other fronts in eastern Afghanistan to broaden the attack against US forces.

　　The Taliban are now striking at Afghan and US positions all along the 2180-kilometer Pakistan-Afghanistan border. Just last weekend they launched an audacious attack a few miles outside Kabul. The Taliban aim is to humble the Americans and the US-backed Afghan government led by Afghan President Hamid Karzai and delay the political process including the adoption of a new constitution this December and general elections next June. Its final expectation is preventing reconstruction by aid agencies andensuring that instability remains.

　　The Pakistani army's actions in NWFP are designed to apprehend Taliban and Al-Qaeda leaders such as Osama bin Laden, who is believed to be hiding out further south. With American funds, the army is building schools, hospitals and roads in NWFP to try to win the tribesmen's support and glean intelligence from them as tothe whereabouts of Taliban and Al-Qaeda leaders.

　　Meanwhile, US officials and Afghan leaders have charged that Pakistan's powerful Inter-Services Intelligence (ISI) is clandestinely providing its own support to the Taliban, a charge Pakistan vehemently denies. On Aug. 31, the Pakistani army spokesman Major General Shaukat Saulat admitted that three to fourofficers had been arrested for links to the Taliban in NWFP. In Afghanistan, officials close to President Karzai said that the officers were in fact captured in Zabul province while helping theTaliban and were handed over to US forces who took them to Pakistan for questioning.

　　The arrests come amidst rising concerns that as President Pervez Musharraf, who is also army chief, allies himself closely to the US in its war against terrorism, Islamic extremism is rising in some part of the army.

　　The army's failure to contain the growing and widespread support for the Taliban amongst Pakistani Pashtuns is not helped by the fact that the neighboring province of the North West Frontier is presently ruled by Muttahida Majlis-e-Amal (MMA), an alliance of six Islamic fundamentalist parties who are all allied to the Taliban.

　　The MMA came to power after winning a majority in last October's general elections. Its two largest component parties are the Jamiat-e-Ullema Islam (JUI) and the Jamaat-e-Islami (JI).

　　The JUI has a long history of backing the Taliban with tens of thousands of Pakistani men. The JI, on the other hand, is backing its former Afghan ally and Brotherhood pan-Islamicist, the Afghan commander Gulbuddin Hekmatyar, who is allied to the Taliban and isactive in eastern Afghanistan. Enditem