Northern Afghan Fighters Disarm

About 200 fighters for one of northern Afghanistan’s key warlords laid down their weapons Monday in a ceremony their leader said may be the first step toward broader disarmament.

“We have turned a new page,” Ata Mohammed told his soldiers marshaled at the 120-year-old Baghjahanuma fort, about 50 miles southeast of the main northern city of Mazar-i-Sharif. “Now is not the time for fighting, now is the time to lay down our guns.”

U.N. officials welcomed the disarmament and an agreement reached Monday between Mohammed and a senior aide to rival commander Gen. Rashid Dostum on security in a northern village.

But the agreement was limited to just one village, Khulm, and a senior U.N. official cautioned that Monday’s ceremony was a gesture rather than an indication that tensions had eased between ethnic groups in the north.