…as Biden defends ‘messy’ pullout
There were scenes of panic at Kabul airport on Monday as desperate residents tried to flee following the Taliban’s seizure of the Afghan capital.
The US army said soldiers shot two armed men, while three people were reported to have died after falling from the underside of a plane they were clinging to shortly after take-off.
The airport was closed earlier for soldiers to try and clear the runways.
US military planes are now landing, including one carrying US marines.
Marines are being flown in to help the evacuation effort. The US and other countries are rushing to remove staff and allies from the country.
A German evacuation plane also landed at Kabul airport on Monday, sources told Reuters news agency.
On Sunday the Taliban declared victory after Afghan President Ashraf Ghani fled abroad and his government collapsed.
The militants’ return to rule brings an end to almost 20 years of a US-led coalition’s presence in the country.
Kabul was the last major city in Afghanistan to fall to a Taliban offensive that began months ago but accelerated in recent days as they gained control of territories, shocking many observers.
The Islamist group was able to seize control after most foreign troops pulled out.
Following the Taliban’s seizure of Kabul, many people headed to the airport.
Evacuations of foreigners and some Afghans with links to foreign governments and organisations have been taking place, but passengers said rumours spread that even those without visas were being allowed to travel.
As huge crowds gathered, US forces reportedly fired into the air to disperse people who were trying to force their way on to planes.
Video obtained by Afghan media outlets also showed people clinging to the side of a plane as it began to taxi on the runway. Another video appeared to show men falling from a plane that had taken off.
Later, a Pentagon spokesman said all flights had been halted “out of an abundance of caution”.
“US military forces are on the scene working alongside Turkish and other international troops to clear the area of people. We do not know how long this will take” John Kirby said.
Kirby also said there were early reports that a US service member had been wounded.
Rakhshanda Jilali, a human rights activist who is trying to leave, said: “How can [the Americans] hold the airport and dictate terms and conditions to Afghans?”
“This is our airport but we are seeing diplomats being evacuated while we wait in complete uncertainty,” she told Reuters news agency.
Thousands of American citizens, locals embassy staff and their families, as well as other “vulnerable Afghan nationals” are to be airlifted in the coming days, the US government has said.
The US has sent 6,000 troops to assist in the evacuation.
At the weekend US President Joe Biden defended the withdrawal of American troops, saying he could not justify an “endless American presence in the middle of another country’s civil conflict”.
More than 60 countries, including the US and the UK, have issued a joint statement saying the Afghan people “deserve to live in safety, security and dignity”, and that security and civil order should be immediately restored.
They also called on the Taliban to allow anyone who wishes to depart to do so, and to keep roads, airports and border crossings open.
A Taliban spokesman said people would be allowed to return home from the airport, Reuters reported.
On Sunday Suhail Shaheen, a Taliban negotiator in Qatar, told the BBC that properties and lives were safe. “We are the servants of the people and of this country,” he said.
About 600 British troops have been deployed to assist with their own withdrawal mission.
Meanwhile, President Joe Biden has said he stands “squarely” behind the US exit from Afghanistan as he faces withering criticism over the Taliban’s lightning conquest of the war-torn country.
“How many more American lives is it worth?” asked the Democratic president.
He said that despite the “messy” pullout, “there was never a good time to withdraw US forces”.
Biden returned on Monday to the White House from the Camp David presidential retreat to make his first public remarks on Afghanistan in nearly a week.
“If anything, the developments of the past week reinforce that ending US military involvement in Afghanistan now was the right decision,” said Biden.
“American troops cannot and should not be fighting in a war and dying in a war that Afghan forces are not willing to fight for themselves.”
Biden is facing intense political backlash over the turmoil in Kabul following his April decision to order all American troops out of Afghanistan by September 11 – the 20 year anniversary of the terror attacks that triggered the US invasion.
Mitch McConnell, Republican Senate Minority Leader, tweeted: “What we are seeing in Afghanistan is an unmitigated disaster. The Biden Administration’s retreat will leave a stain on the reputation of the United States.”
Former US President George W Bush, who authorised the military intervention in 2001, said he was “watching the tragic events unfolding in Afghanistan with deep sadness”.
“The Afghans now at greatest risk are the same ones who have been on the forefront of progress inside their nation,” Bush said, stressing that the US had “the legal authority to cut the red tape for refugees during urgent humanitarian crises”.
In his speech, Biden said the US mission in Afghanistan was never supposed to have been about nation-building.
He said that when he was vice-president he had opposed the 2009 deployment of thousands more troops into the country by former President Barack Obama.
Biden also noted he had inherited a deal negotiated with the Taliban under former President Donald Trump for the US to withdraw from Afghanistan by May of this year.
He said he was now the fourth US president to preside over America’s longest war, and would not pass the responsibility on to a fifth.
“I will not mislead the American people by claiming that just a little more time in Afghanistan will make all the difference.”
Biden campaigned as a seasoned expert in foreign policy and declared after assuming office this year that “America is back”.
Last month he assured reporters it was “highly unlikely” the Taliban would overrun the entire country.
But he conceded on Monday that “this did unfold more quickly than we had anticipated”.
Opinion polls show most Americans support the US exiting Afghanistan.
But Biden is facing a barrage of criticism over the manner of the departure, after he withdrew US troops then sent thousands back in to help the evacuation.
Images emerged on Sunday showing US helicopters circling the US embassy in Kabul.
For many, the pictures evoked America’s humiliating departure from Saigon, Vietnam, in 1975 when Biden was a junior senator.
