Associated Press

An Afghan man searches a container for usable weapons in a prison fortress near Mazar-e-Sharif, northern Afghanistan yesterday. Several hundred pro-Taliban prisoners captured part of the fortress Sunday but were killed during three days of fighting that involved British and U.S. special forces.

KABUL, Afghanistan - The Taliban's supreme leader radioed his commanders yesterday and called on them to fight to the death against Americans in southern Afghanistan, where U.S. Marines were building up their forces at a desert base.

In Washington, U.S. officials said a small group of soldiers from the 10th Mountain Division has assembled outside the northern Afghan city of Mazar-e-Sharif to serve as a quick-reaction force in the event of renewed Taliban resistance. The officials, speaking on condition of anonymity, said the deployment comprised no more than two dozen soldiers. One official said the numbers might be increased.

The 10th Mountain Division had about 1,000 of its soldiers providing security at an air base across the border in southern Uzbekistan for several weeks, the officials said.

Also in the north, anti-Taliban forces began clearing the bodies of hundreds of fighters loyal to Osama bin Laden killed during a three-day prison uprising near Mazar-e-Sharif.

U.S. officials confirmed that CIA officer Johnny M. Spann was killed in the uprising - the first American combat death of the war against terrorism.

The Pentagon said yesterday that U.S. airstrikes damaged a compound near the Taliban's last stronghold, Kandahar, believed used by senior figures from the

Taliban or bin Laden's al-Qaida movement. It was unclear if any were killed.

Pentagon spokeswoman Victoria Clarke said a "confluence of intelligence" indicated that senior Taliban leaders were in the building, including supreme leader Mullah Mohammed Omar, but "we do not have any sense Omar was there."

However, the Pakistan-based South Asian Dispatch Agency quoted a Taliban spokesman, Mullah Abdul Wahab Khairkhwah, as saying Omar was "not too far" from the site when the attack occurred late Tuesday.

The agency quoted an unidentified Taliban official as saying Omar was whisked away at the last moment when militia counterintelligence noted the presence of two men suspected of working for the Americans.

"I think Tuesday was the last day for these two men," the official was quoted as saying.

Yesterday, the Taliban's supreme leader told his commanders to hold fast.

"Stick to your positions and fight to the death," Taliban official Hafiz

Majidullah quoted Omar as saying. "We are ready to face these

Americans. We are happy that they have landed here and we will teach

them a lesson."

At the Pentagon, Rear Adm. John Stufflebeem acknowledged that top

Taliban leaders were still issuing orders, but said describing them as "still firmly in control would be an overstatement."

"I think they have much less control than they have had in the past because they have much less access, again, to some of these intermediate leaders and to those forces," he said yesterday.

In the south, the Taliban leadership is trying to rally support as Pashtun tribal leaders seek to convince lower-ranking militia members to abandon the movement.

However, efforts to lure away Taliban support have been slow, in part because of tribal rivalry in the region of Afghanistan where the Islamic movement was organized in the early 1990s.

In the southern border town of Spinboldak, Taliban negotiators broke off talks yesterday with Pashtun tribesmen about a possible surrender there after the non-Taliban negotiators refused to guarantee the safety of Arabs loyal to bin Laden.

"We're waiting for another invitation from the Taliban for resuming talks since we don't want a war," tribal official Mohammed Anwar said. "If they don't resume talks, then we will have to take the town by force."

Other tribal sources said the talks failed because of rivalry between two Pashtun tribes - the Achakzai and the Nurzai - each of which wants to control Spinboldak.

American warplanes staged an overnight attack on a Taliban convoy at Mail Pull, just north of Spinboldak, according to another tribal leader, Abdul Jabbar. He said anti-Taliban forces reported the column to the Americans.

President Bush launched military operations against Afghanistan on Oct. 7 after the Taliban refused to surrender bin Laden, the top suspect in the Sept. 11 terrorist attacks.

Taliban concern over the safety of their Arab allies has increased following the killings of foreign fighters in the north, which anti-Taliban forces overran this month.

Near Mazar-e-Sharif, anti-Taliban forces cleared the carnage from a mud-walled fortress where the prison uprising occurred. U.S. officials said the prisoners killed Spann, 32, at the start of the uprising.

Some northern alliance fighters removed bonds from the hands of dead fighters before giving their bodies to the Red Cross. But a key alliance official, Gen. Rashid Dostum, insisted his troops treated the prisoners in a "brotherly" manner.

Amnesty International called for an inquiry into the alliances' response to the prisoners' rebellion.

Meanwhile, representatives of the northern alliance and three other Afghan factions met in Germany for a second day yesterday to try to pave the way for a new government.

The United Nations has put forward the idea of a multinational force to keep security while a transitional government is created. But the alliance, which controls around half of Afghanistan, came out against the step.

"We don't feel a need for an outside force. There is security in place," alliance delegation leader Younus Qanooni said. If a more extensive force is needed, it should be comprised of Afghans, he said.

Amid the talk of peace came a hopeful sign: the first elections in the western city of Herat since 1973.

Nearly 630 men turned out at the main mosque for the election, where Muhammad Rafiq Mojaddadi, a former diplomat and Taliban municipal official, defeated seven other candidates with 427 votes. His nearest competitor got only 60.

"I hope I can serve my people," Mojaddadi said, "people who have suffered years of war that has destroyed our country."