A cease-fire between warring militias in western Afghanistan was holding Wednesday, officials said. Dozens of people were reported killed or injured in fighting which broke out last week between Herat Gov. Ismail Khan, a powerful regional leader, and a local rival. With U.S. warplanes circling overhead, Afghan and American officials mediated a truce on Tuesday, and leaders on both sides said Wednesday that their guns remained silent. Amanullah, the rebel commander who agreed to abandon a push toward the provincial capital under the cease-fire, said he didn't know how long it would hold. "We're waiting for the decision of the central government and for a delegation from Kabul to arrive here," he told The Associated Press by telephone from Shindand, in the south of the province. Abdul Wahed Tawakali, a senior intelligence officials who acts as a spokesman for Khan, said the governor's troops were in Adraskan, about 50 kilometers (30 miles) to the north, also awaiting word from the delegation led by Afghan Interior Ministry officials. In the meantime, hundreds of government troops dispatched from Kabul along with a group of U.S. military advisers were acting as a buffer force to keep them apart. "The Afghan National Army is not involved in the fighting," Tawakali told The AP. "They are here to safeguard the cease-fire."
