Pakistani authorities have arrested 16 more suspected Taleban and al-Qaida fighters in a series of raids in the city of Lahore. 

Senior police official Javed Noor said the 16 men - including Arabs, Afghans and Pakistanis - surrendered Monday without much resistance. 

The raids came four days after Pakistani and American agents arrested about 60 Taleban and al-Qaida fugitives, including top al-Qaida commander Abu Zubaydah. He is now in U.S. custody, a development the White House is calling a serious blow to fugitive al-Qaida leader Osama bin Laden. U.S. authorities believe Abu Zubaydah, who was shot three times while trying to escape arrest, knows about plans for future terrorist attacks against the United States and its allies, and possibly the whereabouts of Osama bin Laden. 

Tuesday, a White House spokesman called the detained al-Qaida figure a key terrorist recruiter and operational planner. 

Meanwhile, The New York Times quotes a top Afghan security chief as saying thousands of al-Qaida fighters are trying to regroup on the Pakistan side of the border separating the two South Asian nations. 

Khost provincial security chief Muhammad Mustafa said his agents have reported seeing Osama bin Laden's top deputy, Ayman al-Zawahiri, and a top Taleban military commander, Jalaluddin Haqqani, in the Pakistani border town of Miram Shah. The report said the Afghan claims could not be independently verified. 

Some information for this report provided by AP.

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