KANDAHAR, virtually the last Taliban stronghold in Afghanistan, was reported to have fallen to Northern Alliance forces today.

The claim was made by the Arab satellite TV channel Al-Jazeera but there was no immediate confirmation.

It was also reported that another Taliban stronghold - the eastern city of Jalalabad - had been captured after a night of US bombing and defections to the Northern Alliance.

The loss of the two cities would be a major blow for the Taliban and the fugitive terrorist leader Osama bin Laden.

Bin Laden and his al-Qaida network had a major training base and cave hideouts near Jalalabad while Kandahar is the spiritual home of the Taliban movement.

Only yesterday, Taliban leader Mullah Mohammed Omar urged his followers ''to organise and resist the enemy.

''I am in Kandahar and haven't gone anywhere,'' he said.

Mountain war

Desperate Taliban fighters now appear to be taking to the mountains around Kandahar in preparation for a guerilla war, defence sources said today.

''We are seeing suggestions the Taliban are preparing to conduct some form of guerilla campaign,'' one source said.

''Whether they will be able to sustain that or whether it is just expedience, we have yet to determine.''

The sweeping victories mean the US can now wage a targeted campaign to root out bin Laden and his terrorist network.

US and British special forces accompanying Northern Alliance commanders are searching for computer disks, documents and other items left by the Taliban for information on his whereabouts.

They are also expected to interview defecting Taliban commanders and captured troops.

US Defence Secretary Donald Rumsfeld has warned there would be no let up in the campaign.

The struggle against the perpetrators of the September 11 atrocities was a global conflict that would take time, he said.

''I would like to caution everyone that this effort against terrorism and terrorists is far from over,'' he said.

Long haul

''We are clearly in this for the long haul. We need to find the leadership of al Qaida and the Taliban leadership to stop them.

''Then we need to address that network and other networks elsewhere in the world, but it will take time.''

He said some US special force teams were working with the Northern Alliance and groups of commandos had also been deployed in the south of Afghanistan.

• The eight western aid workers, held by the Taliban for spreading Christianity, may have been released, it was reported today.

Germany's Frankfurter Rundschau newspaper said the German government had reports from foreign intelligence agencies suggesting the eight may already have been released.

A spokeswoman for the German Foreign Ministry refused to comment on the report.

The Christian aid agency Shelter Now, which employs all eight, has also declined to comment.

The eight - four Germans, two Americans and two Australians - have been held since August 3 on charges of trying to convert Muslims.

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