ISLAMABAD (AFP) - The United States and Pakistan today drew the broad outlines of a post-Taliban administration in Afghanistan, where US forces flew their first low-level missions over militia strongholds, indicating that ground troops may soon go into action.

America was gripped with the fear of germ warfare as anthrax was found in the office of Senate majority leader Tom Daschle and a seven-month-old New York boy tested positive for the rare disease.

After two days of crucial talks, US Secretary of State Colin Powell and Pakistani President Pervez Musharraf agreed that any post-Taliban government must be broad-based, multi-ethnic, "friendly" to Pakistan and set up with no outside interference.

Residents in Kandahar, the Taliban stronghold, said intense US raids continued all morning today, with planes buzzing overhead and repeated explosions heard around the southern city.

The day raids followed all-night attacks involving for the first time at least one US AC-130 gunship, a heavily-armoured plane with huge firepower and a helicopter-like ability to linger over battlefields.

'Torrents of cannon fire'

The plane was, in fact, erroneously identified at first as a combat helicopter by the Taliban, who later corrected themselves.

US defence officials confirmed the deployment of an AC-130 over Kandahar, marking a significant departure in the campaign that has been conducted from high altitude since it began on October 7.

The plane uses television, infrared and radar sensors to lock on ground targets on which it unleashes fierce torrents of cannon fire.

Experts said deployment of the AC-130, generally used to provide close air support for special forces assaults, was a further sign that the United States is fast moving towards putting ground troops into action to hunt down Osama bin Laden, alleged mastermind of the September 11 attacks on New York and Washington.

A Taliban spokesman said the overnight raids left 33 civilians dead in Kabul, nine near Kandahar and 19 others in two outlying villages close to Taliban military bases.

But claims of large civilian casualties were rejected in Washington by US Defense Secretary Donald Rumsfeld, who called Taliban leaders "accomplished liars".

He denied Monday that more than 200 civilians died in a raid last week on the eastern village of Kadam, where the militia took reporters from international news organizations to tour the ruins.

Rumsfeld said US forces hit not a village but tunneled-out caves.

General Richard Myers, chairman of the US Joint Chiefs of Staff, added that the village displayed no bomb craters and photo reconnaissance showed Kadam was not densely occupied, if at all, at the time of the strike.

'Need a friendly regime'

Powell, at a joint press conference here with Musharraf, said: "There is no doubt that we both have a common goal to see that the Afghan government is one that will represent all the people of Afghanistan and a regime that obviously will be friendly to all its neighbours, including Pakistan."

Musharraf said they agreed that durable peace in Pakistan's western neighbor would be possible only through a "broad-based, multi-ethnic government," established without outside interference.

Powell said all components of ethnically and linguistically diverse Afghanistan must join discussions on the country's future, including the opposition Northern Alliance and "southern tribal leaders".

This was an apparent reference to the majority Pashtun - the ethnic group currently represented by the Taliban - to which many Pakistanis also belong.

Musharraf, whose foreign ministry Monday said Islamabad did not consider the Taliban to be terrorists, said moderate elements of the ruling militia could also be involved.

Taliban under pressure

"Extremism is not in every Taliban," Musharraf said. "I wouldn't like to get into the details of who are moderates, but we know for sure there are many moderates in the Taliban."

Pakistan was a major supporter of the militia and remains the only country to still recognize the Kabul regime.

With a US air campaign to flush out terror suspect Osama and his al-Qaeda network in its 10th day, it seemed more and more likely that the hold on power of the religious militia sheltering them was increasingly shaky.

Powell said the Taliban were under "enormous pressure", but he would not put a time frame on the eventual collapse of their five-year-old regime.

"Every neighbour has turned against (the Taliban)," Powell told reporters after the press conference, but added: "I cannot tell you when that pressure will cause it to collapse - I just cannot put a time on that."

Powell will later travel to New Delhi for talks with Indian officials, who want Washington to expand its anti-terror campaign to Kashmir and Pakistani-backed Islamic separatists.

'Irresponsible statement'

But Kashmir's top Muslim cleric, Omer Farooq strongly rejected a recent statement by Osama in favor of Kashmiri Muslims, demanding that the United States stop supporting Hindus in the disputed Himalayan territory.

"It is an irresponsible statement," Farooq said. "Storming planes or killing innocents are clear acts of terrorism. No one can justify such acts no matter how big the cause is.

"The struggle in Kashmir is a genuine struggle for Kashmiris' right of self-determination and it has no link whatsoever with the al-Qaeda group," he said.