Visiting Pakistani Interior Minister Moinuddin Haider had a scare at the airport in Kabul Thursday when his plane almost caught fire as it prepared for takeoff, witnesses said.
Hours earlier a small bomb exploded near the airport in what officials from the ruling Taliban Islamic militia said was a message to the minister from armed opposition groups.
Witnesses at the airport said one of the twin engines of Haider's Beechcraft plane started spitting plumes of fire 20 meters (66 feet) long when the pilot tried to start it in vain for the third time.
The minister and his entourage scrambled out of the plane as smoke billowed around them, while some of those gathered nearby to see him off ran for cover.
"Maybe my destiny is to spend some more time with you," Haider was heard joking with his Taliban counterpart, Mulla Abdur Razaq, in the main Pakistan language of Urdu after the incident.
"God was kind to him and to all of us. It was about to explode," a Taliban foreign ministry official told AFP.
Afghan engineers set to work on the engine as the minister waited at the rocket-scarred airport, and he eventually departed in the same plane for the Taliban's southern stronghold of Kandahar after a lengthy delay.
The Pakistan-based Afghan Islamic Press later reported that he arrived safely at Kandahar, where he was met by provincial Governor Mulla Mohammad Hassan and Afghan Ambassador to Pakistan Abdul Salam Zaeef.
Taliban officials said the bomb blast occurred in a residential area about two kilometers (1.2 miles) from Kabul airport three hours before Haider was due to board the flight.
There were no casualties or major damage from the explosion, which is the fifth in the capital in the past two months.
"The explosion was to make them (the Pakistani delegation) hear the bang," a Taliban official said.
Last year the Pakistan embassy was targeted with explosions, but there was no major damage or casualties.
Pakistan, the Taliban Islamic militia's closest ally, denies allegations from opposition forces that it provides men and weapons to the militia's war effort.
Haider is the first high level Pakistani official to visit Afghanistan since Pakistani military ruler General Pervez Musharraf seized power in a coup in October 1999.
Following talks with Razaq here Wednesday, he is expected to meet Foreign Minister Wakil Ahmad Mutawakel and present a letter from Musharraf to supreme Taliban leader Mulla Mohammad Omar in Kandahar.
The talks are focusing on UN sanctions against the Taliban, which is accused of harbouring terrorists, and the worsening humanitarian disaster from drought and war which have driven more than 150,000 Afghan refugees into Pakistan since September -- KABUL (AFP)
© 2001 Al Bawaba (www.albawaba.com)
