Columns of young men carrying the white flag of the Taliban marched through Kabul chanting slogans against the US and the UN, which the Taliban claims is a ``puppet'' of the US.

The Taliban regime appeared to have organised some moderate demonstrations against the sanctions, but were unable to contain hundreds of people who joined the marchers. The crowd converged on two compounds of UN offices, smashing doors, windows and computers. A number of Taliban guards were injured, but no other casualties were reported.

It was unclear yesterday whether those who joined in the violence were Taliban soldiersor ordinary residents. Last week, protesters in three regional cities demonstrated against the sanctions, which freeze Afghanistan's overseas assets and ground the national airline Ariana. In the southern town of Kandahar a crowd pelted a UN office with stones, but were prevented from doing serious damage.

In Kabul yesterday people expressed anger and bewilderment at the sanctions. The Taliban government has sought to play down the impact of the sanctions, but Kabul residents, already facing a winter of economic hardship, are deeply demoralised. ``It is hard enough here,'' said Amanullah Khan, a waiter in central Kabul. ``The ordinary people will suffer and it will make no difference to the government.''

In fact the sanctions are expected to have little impact other than making it very expensive to send post overseas, but recent trade restrictions imposed by Pakistan combined with a poor harvest have led to steep increases in the prices of basic foodstuffs, particularly wheat. According to aid officials,many people in Kabul are already on the edge of starvation.``Many people have, erroneously but dangerously, linked the UN sanctions with all their other myriad economic problems,'' an aid official said.The sanctions, which were imposed by the UN Security Council on October 15, are not likely to force the Taliban, who now control around 80 per cent of Afghanistan, to change their policy on bin Laden.

Mullah Mohammed Omar, the supreme leader of the Taliban, is a close friend of the Saudi-born dissident and has said that he would rather see the destruction of the half of Afghanistan that survived the Soviet invasion untouched than hand over a ``fellow Muslim in need'' to the West.Washington claims that bin Laden runs a global terrorist network from camps in eastern and southern Afghanistan.

Washington has offered $5m for information leading to bin Laden's arrest. Last year, following the bombings of US embassies in Kenya and Tanzania, the US launched 75 cruise missiles against sites linked to the terroristin eastern Afghanistan. An Albanian newspaper said yesterday that police working alongside CIA agents had arrested a Jordanian national in Albania who is suspected of being an associate of bin Laden.

The US agents have escorted the man out of the country, the daily Koha Jone said. It said the businessman, who had been living in Albania since 1992, was a ``close associate of the most wanted terrorist Osama Bin Laden''.UNI adds from Islamabad
-- With the United Nations' sanctions against the ruling Taliban in Afghanistan now in place, the organisation says it was ready to assure the United States that it would not allow anybody, including Saudi dissident Osama bin Laden, to use Afghani soil to wage war against any country.

In an interview to the Urdu service of BBC from Qandhar last night, Taliban spokesman Syed Aqa stuck to his government's stand that bin Laden would not be asked to leave Afghanistan or handed over to any country to be tried for his alleged role in the bombing of Americanembassies in East Africa in August last year killing more than 200 people.

But, he said, the Taliban was willing to hold talks with the United States. asked what they wanted to talk, Syed Aqa said the Taliban would assure the United States that neither bin Laden nor any other person would be allowed to use Afghani soil to wage war against a third country.