TORA BORA, Dec 15: Afghan militia leaders said on Saturday they had found the bodies of 33 Al-Qaeda fighters as they pushed deeper into the mountain strongholds of Osama bin Laden’s diehard followers.

The militias were advancing with the help of fierce air raids, which continued on Saturday. But for the second time in three days an agreement for a large-scale surrender fell through.

US warplanes pounded the mountains. Raids on the White Mountain chain around Tora Bora went on through the night and Saturday with B-52 jets dropping heavy bombs.

The US-allied Afghan forces found the bodies of 33 Al-Qaeda fighters and captured four others as they advanced into the Tora Bora mountains in eastern Afghanistan, a spokesman for militia commander Hazrat Ali said.

The spokesman, Amin said the bodies were found on Friday and Saturday as Ali’s forces moved into caves and tunnels formerly held by the diehard fighters — mainly Arabs and other foreigners.

“We are firing mortar bombs and then advancing into Al-Qaeda territory,” he said. “The bodies are being found as we advance. Most of the bodies are those of Arabs and other foreigners.”

Amin said the four captured fighters would be used to negotiate by radio with those still in the mountains to persuade them to surrender.

Another local militia commander, Said Mohammad Palawan, said earlier that 300 fighters had promised to give themselves up. But there was no sign of this four hours after the surrender was due to start.

Negotiations earlier in the week on a mass surrender also came to nothing.

But US Defence Secretary Donald Rumsfeld confirmed that some 50 fighters gave themselves up on Friday.

Rumsfeld, speaking on Saturday on his way to eastern Europe and Central Asia, also said US and allied Afghan forces advanced two kms in the previous eight hours.

He said a “very energetic battle” was under way with Afghan troops doing most of the fighting while US special forces largely directed air attacks.

He said 180 bombs or missiles had been used on Friday with several sorties still to be made, and 230 to 240 bombs the previous day.

General Tommy Franks, commander of the Afghan operation, said in Florida Afghan fighters had made steady progress but there was still “a lot left to do.”

Franks said surviving Al-Qaeda fighters were not surrounded and some could slip away.

But “the view of the opposition leaders on the ground is that this Al-Qaeda force is contained in that area” between the Tora Bora valleys of Agam and Wazir, he said.

“There are a lot of people who believe he’s in that general area,” Rumsfeld said. “There are people who believe he’s not and we cannot know the answer until we have something very telling, and hard and firm and clear.”

Franks said it was “a possibility that Osama has left the country.”

The US focus is firmly on Al-Qaeda and his group after the Taliban regime which protected Osama and his fighters was toppled from power.

In the southern city of Kandahar, US Marines who took over the airport on Friday resumed flights there after determining that a nearby anti-aircraft missile was in the hands of allied Afghan forces.

The Marines are clearing the airport of mines and booby traps to reopen it for military, aid and commercial flights.

In the city a ban on carrying guns in public went into force on Saturday. Security is a top priority in the capital also.

A British military reconnaissance team was expected in Kabul late on Saturday to help prepare for the deployment of a UN-mandated peacekeeping force, whose advance units could fly in within days.

The team of about 10 is led by Major-General John McColl who, according to British press reports, will command the multinational force.

He is due to meet new interim Afghan leader Hamid Karzai and Defence Minister Mohammad Qasim Fahim on Sunday before flying home on Monday.

They will discuss “what is required on the ground, how many troops are needed and what rules they will operate under,” said British embassy spokesman Paul Sykes.

“If the people here agree to the deployment, the first troops will come pretty quickly. Everyone is focused on the 22nd (of December), when the new government is to take power,” Sykes added.

The Northern Alliance, which led the ousting of the Taliban, has only reluctantly agreed to an international security force and sought to limit its mandate.—AFP