Delicate Balance of Afghan Power Upset by New Force : Asia: Taliban has opened supply routes to Kabul, but uncertainty over group’s goals imperils U.N. peace plan.

After enduring a Kremlin-sponsored putsch, a Muslim jihad and a civil war among Islamic rivals, the people of Kabul on Sunday experienced a new kind of conflict--a sitzkrieg, or sitting war, with a U.N.-sponsored peace plan dangling in the balance.

The arrival of a new fighting force on the outskirts of this battered capital and the ensuing shift in the military balance have endangered a plan for the transfer of power in Afghanistan that had been brokered over the past two months by U.N. officials.

The hand-over of power was supposed to be held today, but that is now out of the question. U.N. sources said Sunday that the country’s nominal president, Burhanuddin Rabbani, is balking at fulfilling his share of the peace plan--namely, formally handing over power to an interim council of two dozen members.

But on the positive side, the seizure of the dun-hued hills south of the capital by the Taliban, a new fighting force composed of traditionalist Muslims that has upset all previous political and military calculations in Afghanistan, has halted the rocketing of Kabul’s now-devastated southern districts by the major opposition faction, the radical fundamentalist Hezb-i-Islami.

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Ten miles south of Kabul, Taliban fighters lolled with their Kalashnikov rifles on Sunday in the recently seized market town of Charasyab.

“God will help us, and we think he will help us to bring peace to Afghanistan,” said Mullah Abdul Samd Halim, 27, who fought against the former Soviet-backed regime and joined the Taliban two months ago.

And Kabul residents, who shopped in force in their city’s dusty street bazaars Sunday afternoon, credited the Taliban with opening up vital supply lines to the south of the country.

In the past week, prices for essentials such as bread and diesel fuel, used for heat in many of Kabul’s squat homes of brick and adobe, have dropped significantly, in many cases by half, said Muhammad Aref, a former teacher in Kabul University’s natural sciences department.

“In Kabul, they’re happy the shelling has stopped. Now there’s no rockets. And the prices are coming down,” Aref said.

But among Kabul residents, he said, there was still uncertainty about the Taliban’s ultimate goals.

The Taliban movement, which has taken control of a third of Afghanistan since September, began among students in Muslim religious schools who were outraged at the death and destruction caused by three years of warfare among rival moujahedeen commanders.

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The commanders and their soldiers cooperated to overthrow the old Kremlin-backed regime of President Najibullah in April, 1992. But they soon began fighting bitterly among themselves and subjected much of Afghanistan to plunder and thuggery.

One of the major objections that Taliban leaders have to the U.N.-engineered peace plan is the presence of some of the rival factions in the new power structure, said Charles Santos, political adviser to the U.N. mission in Kabul.

The Taliban’s Halim, who commands half a dozen tanks seized when the group forced Prime Minister Gulbuddin Hekmatyar’s Hezb-i-Islami out of its Charasyab headquarters Tuesday, likened some of the moujahedeen groups to their former common enemy.

“There is only a small difference between the Communists and some of these groups,” Halim said. “They do bad things to the people, and so did the Communists.”

On a mission of persuasion, U.N. special envoy Mahmoud Mestiri scheduled an evening meeting with President Rabbani on Sunday and was supposed to meet again with Taliban leaders today.

“Our feeling is that this may be a step-by-step process,” said Santos, putting a brave face on the delay in implementing the peace plan.

The fine print of the U.N.-sponsored peace program calls for Rabbani to cede power to an interim council that will implement a nationwide cease-fire and decide on the formation of a neutral government.

One member of the council, Sultan Mahmoud Ghazi, 69, a cousin of Afghanistan’s exiled king, acknowledged that the Taliban’s rapid territorial gains had altered all bets about Afghanistan’s future.

“I myself don’t know the game,” he said.

The Taliban also is insisting that a neutral security force be set up to guard Kabul, that members of the new council be “good Muslims” and that the country’s new government represent all religious and ethnic groups.

Although some Kabul residents were apprehensive about what the presence of the Taliban at the gates of Kabul could portend, the group’s eviction of Hekmatyar and the clearing of the road heading south from the capital seem to have brought only benefits.

The road had been blocked by rival factions who extorted money from passing cars and trucks and sometimes killed or raped their occupants. By opening the road, the Taliban fighters ensured a much greater flow of food and other goods into the capital.

In the former no-man’s-land of wrecked homes and buildings in southern Kabul, women carried enormous bundles of firewood through the streets, and men pedaled their bicycles. It was proof that, at least for the moment, people do not fear a renewal of the bombardments.

Many questions remain about the Taliban and the type of Islamic government its seeks for Afghanistan. But some in Kabul believe the group’s rise has signaled an end to the suffering and bloodshed that began in earnest with the Moscow-engineered coup in 1979 and the Soviet invasion.

“I think it must bring peace,” Aref said.