Afghanistan's ruling Taliban militia said Saturday that the hijackers of an Indian Airlines jet who released their hostages Friday in Kandahar had already left the country, Afghan Islamic Press (AIP) reported.

"I am sure they are no longer in Afghanistan," the Pakistan-based news agency quoted Taliban spokesman Abdul Hayee Motamain as saying in Kandahar in southern Afghanistan.

The hijackers abandoned the plane which had grounded at the Kandahar airport for a week, set free its 155 passengers and crew in exchange for the release of three Muslim militants from Indian jails.

The Taliban authorities told the hijackers and the three released militants to leave Afghanistan within 10 hours after refusing to grant political asylum to the air pirates.

"The Taliban will fulfill the promise" to evict them as agreed with the Indian government and the United Nations officials, Motamain said.

The hijackers seized the Indian plane on Christmas eve on its flight from Kathmandu, Nepal, to New Delhi and ordered its landing in Kandahar the next morning.