The World - News from March 21, 1988

Afghan guerrillas denounced Moscow’s latest offer to withdraw from Afghanistan as a ploy to pressure the United States and its Pakistan ally into a peace settlement on Soviet terms. Moscow said last week that it would pull its 115,000 troops out of Afghanistan with or without a U.N.-mediated agreement. Gulbuddin Hekmatyar, elected last week as head of a seven-party guerrilla alliance based in Pakistan, called the Kremlin statement “a pressure tactic.” He said in Islamabad, Pakistan, that the Muslim rebels would continue to attack Soviet soldiers during a withdrawal unless a rebel government was installed in Kabul.