Bush put halt to king's return

President Bush last week pre-empted the return home of Afghanistan's exiled monarch by advising Italy's prime minister, Silvio Berlusconi, that the former king, who lives in Rome, would face an attempt on his life in his native country, members of the royal family and Italian officials said Tuesday.

Mohammed Zahir Shah, 87, was scheduled to travel to Afghanistan on Monday and prepare a long-awaited grand assembly of tribal and ethnic leaders to help stabilize the volatile political scene. Italy's foreign ministry was arranging the trip and had prepared a security escort.

Hamid Karzai, the interim Afghan leader, was supposed to arrive in Rome on Saturday to personally escort Zahir Shah home. The U.S. ambassador to Rome, Melvin Sembler of St. Petersburg, even held a farewell party for Zahir Shah last Wednesday. On Thursday, Bush called Berlusconi. A U.S. official said Bush asked the Italians to provide bodyguards for Zahir Shah. Berlusconi agreed but said it would take time to arrange for an Italian security squad to travel with the exiled king.

U.S. keeping a wary eye on Khost

American forces are closely watching volatile eastern Afghanistan but have not yet figured out exactly how many al-Qaida and Taliban are hiding there and what they're up to, Defense officials said Tuesday.

They played down a report by Afghans that there have been recent sightings of al-Qaida leader Osama bin Laden and top aide Ayman al-Zawahri in the area near the city of Khost.

Al-Zawahri is believed to have recruited many other key al-Qaida lieutenants through his organization, Islamic Jihad, the secretive militant group blamed for the 1981 assassination of Egyptian President Anwar Sadat.

"The Khost area is a tense situation. ... It remains a dangerous place," said Pentagon briefer Brig. Gen. John W. Rosa Jr. "I think it would be premature to start trying to characterize what we're seeing."

Rosa said that while there had been no engagements with enemy fighters in more than a week, coalition pilots flew 150 mission over Afghanistan Monday and continued to search the area of Operation Anaconda -- the large ground assault against other regroupings of al-Qaida and Taliban early this month.

Other news ...

ANTHRAX DEATH SUIT FILED: Attorneys for the family of Thomas L. Morris Jr., the Washington, D.C., postal worker who died last year of inhalation anthrax, filed a multimillion-dollar lawsuit accusing a Maryland medical center of misdiagnosing his symptoms three days before his death.

SECURITY FORCE HAMPERED: The United States said it opposes extending the international security force in Afghanistan beyond Kabul, dealing a crippling blow to hopes for a broadened peacekeeping operation.

REID CAN TALK WITH HIS LAWYERS: A federal judge eased restrictions on defense lawyers' access to accused shoe bomber Richard C. Reid, but banned them from repeating the conversations, saying "we are engaged in a war on terrorism."

Chief U.S. District Judge William G. Young said that federal prosecutors did not have the authority to limit contact between Reid and his defense.

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