Powell Assures Afghans of U.S. Help

``This country needs everything,'' Powell said on NBC's ``Today'' show. ``It needs a banking system. It needs a health-care system. It needs a sanitation system. It needs a phone system. It needs road construction. Everything you can imagine.''

Prime Minister Karzai, obviously buoyed by Powell's visit, emphasized Afghanistan's deep needs during a joint news conference at the presidential palace.

``The Afghan people have been asking for a staying commitment, a staying partnership, from the United States to Afghanistan in order to make the region safe, in order to make Afghanistan stand back on its own feet and continue to fight against terrorism or the return of terrorism in any form to this country,'' Karzai said.

Powell assured Karzai that Washington would be steadfast.

``We don't want to leave any contamination behind,'' Powell said of continuing military efforts to purge Afghanistan of terrorists. ``That is in the interests of the Afghan people and certainly the mission we came here to perform.''

In Washington, the U.S. government released photos and video excerpts of five suspected al-Qaida members delivering what Attorney General John Ashcroft described as ``martyrdom messages from suicide terrorists.'' Ashcroft called upon people worldwide to help ``identify, locate and incapacitate terrorists who are suspected of planning additional attacks against innocent civilians.''

The United States holds bin Laden and al-Qaida responsible for the Sept. 11 terror attacks on the United States. Washington opened its military campaign in Afghanistan to rout the extremist Taliban regime which was sheltering bin Laden and his organization.

In a continuing sign of lawlessness outside Kabul, two trucks belonging to the United Nations' World Food Program were hijacked by gunmen in northern Afghanistan, the U.N. said Thursday, in the latest report of banditry hampering aid operations in the country.

U.S. troops on Thursday were helping Afghan forces in a disarmament campaign in one of country's most potentially volatile regions, where weapons are plentiful and law enforcement is minimal.

The joint U.S.-Afghan force was collecting weapons house to house in the southern town of Spinboldak, near the border with Pakistan in Kandahar province, once the heartland of the Taliban. Marine demolitions teams exploded old warheads for surface-to-air missiles discovered at a Taliban air-defense site, Marine officials said at a daily briefing in Kandahar, where the United States has its largest base in Afghanistan.

Despite intense U.S. airstrikes on suspected al-Qaida hideouts in Afghanistan, how many of its members remain at large is unclear. Many may have fled into Pakistan and gone into hiding in the rugged territory.

Five men clad in burqas, the all-covering female garment once mandated by the Taliban, were arrested Wednesday in Pakistan's Punjab province following a high-speed chase that began after the men's car ran down a pedestrian, witnesses and officials said.

Interior Ministry officials, speaking on condition of anonymity, confirmed that some foreign nationals, including Arabs, were among the arrested men. Ministry sources said they believed the arrested men belonged to al-Qaida.

Three Marines from the 26th Marine Expeditionary Unit were injured when an unknown item exploded in a burn pit while they were burning trash at their base camp in Kandahar. Central Command headquarters in Tampa, Fla., said in a brief statement that the injuries were not life-threatening. The Marines were evaluated, treated at the base and are expected to be transported to another facility for follow-on medical care. No other details were provided.

Powell, the first secretary of state to visit Afghanistan since Henry Kissinger in 1976, came on a secret flight plan from Islamabad, Pakistan, to the Bagram airport north of Kabul. There, he transferred to a U.S. Army helicopter for a flight to the capital's newly reopened international airport, still bearing the scars of relentless airstrikes during the U.S. bombing campaign of last year.

Soldiers in full camouflage gear watched intently as Powell later stood amid children waving small U.S. flags at the formal reopening of the U.S. Embassy. The secretary, during his five-hour stay, handed out awards to Afghan employees who looked after the embassy during its more than decade-long closure.