David M. Benett/Dave Benett/Getty Images for Hugo Boss UK
(LONDON) — Prince Harry gave an impassioned speech at an awards ceremony last night, pleading with governments and pharmaceutical companies to do more to vaccinate the world.
“Where you’re born should not affect your ability to survive, when the drugs and know-how exist to keep you alive and well,” the Duke of Sussex told attendees of the 24th annual GQ Men of the Year Awards.
Harry was presenting The Heroes of the Year Award to Professor Dame Sarah Gilbert, Dr. Catherine Green and the team behind the Oxford/AstraZeneca vaccine.
Speaking via video link, he called them “heroes of the highest order who gave us an instrument to fight this disease,” adding, “They are our nation’s pride and we are deeply indebted to their service.”
But as he hailed “their breakthrough research” he also called on others to do more.
“Until every community can access the vaccine, and until every community is connected to trustworthy information about the vaccine, then we are all at risk,” he said.
He went on, “As people sit in the room with you tonight, more than a third of the global population has received at least one dose of the vaccine. That’s more than 5 billion shots given around the world so far. It sounds like a major accomplishment, and in many ways is. But there is a huge disparity between who can and cannot access the vaccine. Less than 2% of people in the developing world have received a single dose at this point and many of their health care workers are still not even vaccinated. We cannot move forward together unless we address this imbalance as one.”
The duke also spoke about the misinformation campaigns that are adding to vaccine hesitancy: “This is a system we need to break if we are to overcome COVID-19 and the rise of new variants,” he said.
He then called on “global governments, pharmaceutical leaders, and heads of business” to do their part.
“That must include sharing vaccine science and supporting and empowering developing countries with more flexibility,” he said.
Harry and his wife Meghan, the Duchess of Sussex, have previously spoken out on vaccine inequality.
Last May the pair were campaign chairs of “Vax Live: The Concert to Reunite the World,” an international COVID-19 vaccination effort organized by Global Citizen.
Speaking at that event Harry said, “None of us should be comfortable thinking that we could be fine when so many others are suffering. In reality, and especially with this pandemic, when any suffer, we all suffer,” Harry also said in his remarks. “We must look beyond ourselves with empathy and compassion for those we know, and those we don’t. We need to lift up all of humanity and make sure that no person or community is left behind.”
(LONDON) — At one minute before midnight local time on Aug. 31, the last U.S. servicemember was withdrawn from Afghanistan. It marked the end to almost two decades of war and a frantic and heavily criticized evacuation effort prompted by the Taliban rapidly recapturing the country.
The effort, marred by a deadly terror attack, brought 123,000 people, including 5,500 U.S. citizens out of the country since the middle of August in what American officials have described as one of the largest, most complex evacuations in history.
But other countries played a role in getting large numbers of people out of Afghanistan, including those in the region, Europe and Asia. Their flights evacuated tens of thousands, including some U.S. citizens, according to officials and reports, even as thousands more who were hoping to leave the country were left behind — risking a refugee crisis in the region and beyond amid deep humanitarian need.
Here is a look at some of those efforts:
The U.S. did not work alone in overseeing the mass evacuation. As of Aug. 30, Qatar and the United Arab Emirates said they had facilitated the evacuation of 40,000 and 36,500 respectively, with a massive security operation that other countries were able to tap into.
Among those evacuated were citizens and allies of NATO members, as well as other countries who had citizens in Afghanistan, with the Aug. 31 deadline looming and the Taliban indicating that any extension to U.S. troop presence in the country would be considered a “red line.” An estimated 17,000 were flown out as part of the British evacuation effort, codenamed Operation Pitting, from the beginning of the Taliban offensive to Aug. 31. Some 5,000 of those were British nationals, the U.K. Ministry of Defense told ABC News.
Between 100 and 200 U.K. nationals are estimated to have been left behind, and on Wednesday a spokesperson for the prime minister’s office confirmed to ABC News that an envoy had been dispatched to Qatar to speak with Taliban officials about the safe passage of those still in the country, even as the Taliban are now in control of the airport.
On Saturday, French President Emmanuel Macron announced the country had evacuated 2,834 people from Afghanistan. The military estimate that a “few dozen” French nationals were left behind.
Germany successfully evacuated 5,300 people including more than 530 German nationals and approximately 4,400 Afghans, according to the foreign ministry and Italy’s foreign minister said the country has taken on the largest number of Afghan evacuees in the European Union, with close to 5,000 Afghan citizens arriving in the country, according to Agence France-Presse.
In Eastern Europe, hundreds of Afghans have arrived in Kosovo, Albania, North Macedonia, many of whom are being housed temporarily at U.S. request and expected to travel on to America, according to local media reports. Russia evacuated some its own citizens, as well as those of its former Soviet allies from Afghanistan last week, according to Russia’s defense minister.
Japan evacuated one national and 15 Afghans, but around 500 people who sought evacuation were left behind after the suicide bombing at Kabul airport led to a reluctance to continue, according to Kyodo News.
In addition to the air evacuations, many Afghans have sought asylum across Afghanistan’s land borders, particularly as the airport became increasingly difficult to get to. Tens of thousands of people have crossed at two major border crossings – Spin Boldak in the south and Torkham in the north. The border, however, is closed to refugees, local officials have said.
Prior to the Taliban offensive, Iran officially had a population of 780,000 Afghan refugees, although it is estimated that a further 2 million may be living in the country without documentation, according to the UNHCR.
However the government, after initially indicating it may be receptive to the idea of accepting new Afghan refugees, has now adopted a policy of not letting Afghans in through one of the country’s main land borders, Iranian state-affiliated media reports.
Bordering Tajikistan and Uzbekistan are both dealing with an influx on Afghans, though so the numbers are estimated in the low thousands. They are reportedly expected to be flown onward to third countries.
The evacuation efforts are unlikely to be the last the world sees in terms of the mass movement of people from the country. Last week the U.N. estimated around 500,000 new refugees in the region seeking to leave the country as a “worst case scenario.” The EU is reportedly drafting a package of more than $700 million worth of aid to Afghanistan’s neighbors amid fears of a repeat of the migrant crisis following the Syrian civil war, according to the Financial Times.
And even with the U.S. led evacuation efforts wrapped up, there is growing pressure from the international community for the Taliban to continue to allow Afghans to leave the country, with many foreign nationals as well as tens of thousands of Afghans who helped during the U.S.’s longest war facing an unknown fate under the new regime.
(WASHINGTON) — For the thousands of Afghan evacuees bound for the U.S., their rescue flights to America were just one more step in a long journey, but for the airline crews who brought them here — the flights are the most memorable of their careers.
“You felt a part of them because you were the first face they saw when they left those gates,” United Airlines flight attendant Hope Williams said after a flight from Doha, Qatar, to Ramstein Air Base in Germany. “I think when someone tells you that you’re going to safety, that’s what makes the difference.”
Williams worked one of the first U.S. relief flights for United.
“I feel like I lived up to the name my parents gave me. My name is Hope, and even for seven hours — it was short, but I gave them hope,” Williams told ABC News in an interview at Washington Dulles International Airport. “It was a relief to see the children once they made it onto the plane, even at a young age. I think they understood that they were safe.”
United, American and Delta are among six U.S. commercial carriers that bring evacuees to the U.S. under Civil Air Reserve Fleet (CRAF), a Department of Defense program that allows the federal government to use commercial planes during a national defense crisis. The program has only been activated twice before.
Onboard Williams’ flight were dozens of young children, a mother who had a caesarian section three days earlier, her newborn child and an amputee who had been thrown over the airport wall in Kabul. Many had no idea of the plane’s destination.
“Immediately everyone said, where are we going? We’re going to Germany. Where are we going after that? The United States of America. There are a lot of smiles, especially from the children. They did speak English and were able to articulate that to the parents.”
For many evacuees, it was their first time flying.
“I had an elderly lady friend in the back. And unfortunately, the seat that she was sitting in was just to two seats. She was able to sit there by herself, but towards the end, like during the flight, she laid down on the floor, it was just so uncomfortable. But that’s not safe. We’re not allowed to do that. So just talking to her, rubbing her back, I think that made the difference. Felt like grandma to me,” Williams said.
When the first flights arrived at Dulles, federal officials weren’t fully prepared for the arrivals. Evacuees were kept on planes as long as 12 hours after landing. United brought food, diapers, toy and new crews on board to help.
Monique Williams is normally a manager at Dulles but is also a trained flight attendant. When the first flight waited at the gate for six hours with the original crew, she swapped in and stayed on board until customs agents finally gave clearance to deplane.
“I spoke to a woman who was on board with her husband and her twin kids, a boy and a girl. And she was talking to me about her, how her husband works for the U.S. government. And she was discussing how they had to basically within 10 minutes time, pick up whatever they could carry to get in a car, to get out of one location, to try to change cars, to get into another location, to change cars again for the third time, to finally get to the [Kabul] airport. And she mentioned how it was days that they didn’t have adequate food or water, they didn’t shower,” she said.
“I just have to commend our crews because they didn’t want to leave,” she added. “They wanted to stay on the flight with all the people because they had heard these stories. They had built relationships. They had built bonds in the short period of time that they didn’t want to leave them. It was like their family.”
United CEO Scott Kirby flew to Washington to hear the stories.
“They’ll never be another moment like this in my career. And we at United Airlines, all of us, we’re honored to play a small role in helping get the people back here to the United States,” Kirby said. “Dulles Airport for many of these people is going to be like the Statue of Liberty and Ellis Island. This will be the place that they always remember where they came to freedom.”
ABC News’ Amanda Maile and Nate Luna contributed to this report
(WASHNGTON) — When the young boy, just 13 or 14 years-old, was safely inside the gates of Kabul’s international airport, U.S. State Department officials there asked two questions: Where were his parents? And why was there blood all over his clothes?
“He said that somebody was killed right in front of him, and his whole family dispersed,” said a State Department official, recounting their harrowing 12 days on the ground in Afghanistan.
They were one of dozens of U.S. diplomats who, along with thousands of U.S. troops, helped evacuate more than 123,000 of their fellow Americans, Afghans, and other foreigners fleeing the Taliban.
But that effort also left behind as many as 200 U.S. citizens who were trying to escape and the “majority” of Afghans who worked with U.S. diplomatic and military personnel, according to a senior State Department official, and now fear their lives are at risk from Taliban reprisals.
“Everybody who lived it is haunted by the choices we had to make and by the people we were not able to help depart in this first phase of the operation,” said the senior official, speaking on condition of anonymity at the State Department’s request.
The all-hands-on-deck effort marshaled hundreds of State Department personnel in Washington and at embassies around the world, even rivaling the global repatriation operation at the start of the coronavirus pandemic in spring 2020, according to officials.
Afghanistan Coordination Task Force, an emergency operation headquartered at the State Department, has brought together hundreds of U.S. officials across agencies, including from the departments of Defense, Homeland Security, and Health and Human Services, which manages refugee resettlement, and helped coordinate approximately 55,000 calls and 33,000 emails to U.S. citizens in Afghanistan to try to bring them to safety, according to the department. As that operation shifts to help Americans and Afghans left behind, the senior State Department official conceded the evacuation efforts weren’t “pretty, it was very challenging. … It involved some really painful tradeoffs and choices for everybody involved.”
The youngest of those Americans still there may be “Ali,” whose real name ABC News is not using to protect him and his family. The three-year-old boy was born in the Sacramento area, and both his father “Ramin” and mother “Sahar” are U.S. lawful permanent residents, or Green card holders. Ramin moved the family, including Ali’s three older siblings, to Kabul a couple of years ago, drawn to a career as a social worker in his home country.
But with the collapse of the Afghan government – the speed of which surprised even U.S. officials – they scrambled to get out, the family told ABC News affiliate KGO. They said they received instructions from the U.S. embassy in Kabul on how to approach the airport, but were beaten back and blocked by Taliban fighters – too fearful to attempt again.
The senior State Department official said while there was enough cooperation with the Taliban to get tens of thousands of evacuees through, it regularly broke down when the militant group’s checkpoints were overwhelmed by the crowds or when messages from leadership didn’t travel fast enough to fighters on the ground.
“We had zero ability to control that inflow beyond the physical gates of the airport complex,” they told reporters Wednesday.
The State Department’s operation also struggled to provide detailed instructions on how to access the airport to Americans and Afghan partners that wouldn’t end up spreading through the massive crowds. Instead, any unique credential was quickly shared and became useless for U.S. and allied service members manning the fortified walls of Kabul airport.
“It was no longer a viable credential to differentiate among populations, and we simply did not have the people or the time to be able to try to sift through that crowd of people demanding access,” the senior official said.
That meant especially for Afghans who worked for the U.S. — sometimes known as SIVs, for the special immigrant visas they’ve applied for — were left in the crowds.
“We weren’t able to differentiate in the ways we all wanted to pull in those SIV populations,” the senior official added, declining to provide any figures for how many were evacuated, but saying “anecdotal evidence” suggested the “majority” were not.
Operations to rescue Americans, Afghan partners, and other foreigners also became increasingly dangerous as the operation stretched on. The threat from ISIS-K became horribly real when a suicide bomber detonated explosives outside Abbey Gate last Thursday, killing at least 182 people, including 13 U.S. service members.
But officials were also concerned about the crowds themselves, especially as desperation grew with the clock ticking down to President Biden’s Aug. 31 deadline.
“It’s not a criticism of the people who were desperate to leave, it’s just the characteristics of human behavior in those kinds of conditions — I think people don’t understand that those crowds that were outside the access points were on the verge of flipping to a mob at any given moment of any given day,” said the senior official.
Now, it will be up to U.S. consular officers to help the hundreds of other Americans and tens of thousands of Afghan partners escape whatever comes next in Afghanistan.
“It was really disheartening,” a second consular officer, who flew to Washington from the U.S. embassy in Canada to assist in evacuation efforts, said of the long shifts on the phone or emails trying to help U.S. citizens in Afghanistan.
In some cases, those individual calls provided personalized instructions for U.S. citizens and residents or at-risk Afghans to access Kabul airport, including a rally point to meet before approaching the gates amid the high threat of attack.
A third State Department official, based at the U.S. embassy in New Delhi, recounted talking to an Afghan woman who only spoke Dari, the Afghan dialect of Persian, but in her basic Urdu and his broken Hindi, he was able to provide instructions on how to access the airport.
“That kept us going all the time — that everybody felt the desperation of the Afghans and wanted to help them and knew it was a matter of time, that we had limited time to help as many people as possible and everybody went out of their way,” said the first State Department official.
But sticking to that timeline has drawn outrage against Biden, accused by Republican lawmakers and some veterans’ groups of abandoning Americans and especially Afghan allies.
“The unwillingness of the U.S. government to protect these trusted allies is an unconscionable failure that could have been avoided,” Adam Bates, policy counsel at the International Refugee Assistance Project, or IRAP, said Tuesday. “The United States not only has an ongoing moral, but also a legal obligation to protect them and all Afghan allies.”
Biden rejected that in an address Tuesday, saying staying longer would have put more U.S. troops at risk by violating former President Donald Trump’s deal with the Taliban: “That was the choice, the real choice – between leaving or escalating.”
For that first State Department official, however, there was no time to dwell on the life-or-death implications for the Afghan people they encountered just inside Kabul airport’s fortified gates – some of whom they were forced to turn away if they weren’t cleared by the U.S. government to travel.
“There were so many people, the need was so great all the time, that we just tried to do what we were supposed to do and get as many people out,” said the official.
Volunteering to help process people, the official arrived with other consular officers on Aug. 17, just two days after Kabul fell to the Taliban. Working 12-hour shifts, consular officers waited behind a line of U.S. special forces to check the documents of Americans, Afghans, and others who were granted entry to the airport — before they could move through another line of U.S. forces and board evacuation flights.
Warning shots were being fired “constantly” by Afghan and Taliban troops on the perimeter, per the official, with the use of flash bangs and at least one instance of tear gas as well. Most people waited three to five days just to get inside, they added — calling it “horrendous.”
“The people that tried to get through those gates, it was a horrifying experience for them, and as consular officers, we were thrilled to be able to do what we could to evaluate their eligibility as quickly as possible,” the official said.
Among the most heartbreaking scenes were the unaccompanied minors — children who lost parents and ended up inside the airport’s walls. Scores of them have been evacuated from Kabul to Doha, Qatar, where UNICEF has custody of them and is working to reunify them with parents and family, according to State Department officials.
Asked how so many children ended up alone, the official said, “Chaos. You can’t even imagine the chaos that was outside the gate.”
“On any given day, we had over 30 children that were separated … They were all traumatized,” the official added.
At least four children were orphaned after their father was killed by the Taliban and their mother was crushed in the crowds outside the airport, a source on the ground told ABC News last week. Others may have been pushed through “for safety” by their parents, according to the State Department official, “But I can tell you any parent that did that did that out of desperation and a love for their child.”
Officials from the U.S. and allied countries, especially Norway, worked together at the airport to care for them, with service members playing with them, rocking babies, and providing supplies like diapers, food, and bottles. Norway set up a reunification center that “quickly got overwhelmed, there were so many children that were separated,” the official said.
For Ali and his family, they are at least still together. But the road ahead — perhaps literally — is unclear.
The family told KGO that they have connected with other Americans on the ground in Afghanistan, leaving a safe house in Kabul to find their own way.
(KABUL, Afghanistan) — With the U.S. military and diplomatic withdrawal now complete after 20 years in Afghanistan, the Taliban has taken over the country, including the Kabul airport, the site of an often-desperate evacuation effort the past two weeks.
But even as the last American troops were flown out to meet President Joe Biden’s Aug. 31 deadline, other Americans who wanted to flee the country were left behind and the Biden administration is now focused on a “diplomatic mission” to help them leave.
When President Joe Biden sat down with ABC News’ George Stephanopoulos for an exclusive one-on-one interview at the White House on Aug. 18, he said he was committed to keeping the U.S. military in Afghanistan as long as needed. “If there are American citizens left, we’re going to stay until we get them all out,” he said.
Here are the latest developments. All times Eastern:
Sep 01, 3:43 pm
Officials ‘haunted by choices’ at airport, ‘majority’ of SIVs left behind: State Department official
As the State Department shifts to help Americans and Afghans left behind evacuate, a senior official conceded the evacuation efforts weren’t “pretty, it was very challenging. … It involved some really painful tradeoffs and choices for everybody involved.”
“Everybody who lived it is haunted by the choices we had to make and by the people we were not able to help depart in this first phase of the operation,” a senior State Department official who was on the ground at the airport in Kabul told reporters late Wednesday morning.
But the official praised the “heroic” consular officers who processed those who entered the airport and at times walked the line looking through the massive crowds for U.S. passports and Green cards — and offered some explanations for what went wrong and arguing those crowds outside the gates bordered on “mob violence.”
The official said, based on anecdotal evidence, that “the majority” of Special Immigrant Visa holders were left behind — those Afghan interpreters, guides and others who helped U.S. forces and applied for a visa — along with their families.
“We feel an enormous commitment to keep faith with all of the people to whom we owe this debt, and we’re going to continue to do everything we can in the coming weeks and months to fulfill that commitment and to help those who wish to leave Afghanistan to do so.”
The official declined to provide more details on what that looks like just yet.
Sep 01, 2:25 pm
’Possible’ US will partner with Taliban against ISIS-K
Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff Gen. Mark Milley, asked about the relationship between the U.S. and Taliban going forward, given their recent and uneasy cooperation during the evacuation mission, offered a pragmatic view, without sugar-coating the militant group.
“We don’t know what the future of the Taliban is. But I can tell you from personal experience that this is a ruthless group from the past, and whether or not they change remains to be seen,” Milley said. “And as far as our dealings with them at that airfield or in the past year or so, in war, you do what you must in order to reduce risk to mission and force, not what you necessarily want to do.”
Asked whether the U.S. might coordinate with the Taliban against ISIS-K, the terror group responsible for a suicide bomber attack last week which that killed 13 U.S. service members and 170 Afghans, Milley said, “It’s possible.”
Defense Secretary Austin then chimed in, “I would not want to make any predictions.”
Sep 01, 1:48 pm
Top US general to forces: ‘Your service mattered’
Chariman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff Gen. Mark Milley vowed that the Pentagon will continue it counterterrorism efforts despite not having troops on the ground in Afghanistan, echoing President Biden’s remarks from Tuesday in saying the U.S. mission has changed over time.
“For the past 20 years, there’s not been a major attack on our homeland. And it is now our mission to ensure that we continue our intelligence efforts, continue our counterterrorism efforts, continue our military efforts to protect the American people for the next 20 years,” he said.
Defense Sec. Austin: “It’s our duty to defend this nation, and we’re not going to take our eye off the ball. And that means relentless counterterrorism efforts against any threat to the American people from any place.” https://t.co/Wfv8QKQBYUpic.twitter.com/zZNfMPCfms
Milley said that as of Wednesday morning, approximately 20,000 Afghans have arrived at eight different military bases in the continental U.S. and more refugees are on the way. Since the evacuation mission began, he said 124,334 people were airlifted out of Afghanistan by the U.S. and partners.
“Those 124,000, they never knew the 13 who died, and they will never know the 22 who were wounded or the thousands of dead and thousands of wounded who came before them. But they will now live in freedom because of American blood shed on their behalf,” Milley said.
The top U.S. general closed his remarks with a message for service members.
“We’re all conflicted. Feelings of pain and anger, sorrow and sadness, combined with pride and resilience,” he said. “One thing I am certain of: For any soldier, sailor, Marine and their family, your service mattered, and it was not in vain.”
Sep 01, 1:26 pm
Top Pentagon officials speak on Afghanistan withdrawal
Secretary of Defense Lloyd Austin spoke on the U.S. military’s withdrawal from Afghanistan after 20 years from the Pentagon on Wednesday, offering his thanks to U.S. forces and their families.
“We have concluded our historic evacuation operation and ended the last mission of the U.S. war in Afghanistan. America’s longest war has come to a close,” he said.
Austin hailed the historic evacuation effort in an “immensely dangerous” environment over the past few weeks. He reminded that 2,461 troops were killed in Afghanistan, as well as the more than 20,000 injured — “some still carrying the scars that you can’t see on the outside.”
Defense Sec. Austin: “My thoughts have been with the brave Americans who stood up to serve after Al-Qaeda attacked us on September 11, 2001. And my heart is with their families and loved ones.”https://t.co/Wfv8QKQBYUpic.twitter.com/ReEDPzgA6W
“Our forces risk their own lives to save the lives of others. And 13 of our very best paid the ultimate price. Many of them were too young to personally remember the 9/11 attacks,” he said. “The United States military will always honor their heroism.”
Speaking directly to Afghan war veterans and their families, Austin said he understands it’s been a difficult time but said he hopes they can look back at the long conflict with “thoughtfulness and respect.”
“I’ve heard strong views from many sides in recent days, and that’s vital. That’s democracy. That’s America,” he said. “As we always do, this department will look back clearly and professionally, and learn every lesson that we can.”
“Right now, it’s time to thank all those who served in this war,” he added.
Sep 01, 12:30 pm
Putin says US achieved ‘nil’ in Afghanistan war
Russian President Vladimir Putin again poured scorn on the U.S. military’s 20-year presence in Afghanistan, saying on Wednesday the nation achieved “nil” in an attempt to “civilize the local people.”
“The only result is tragedies and losses for those who were doing that, the United States, and especially for the people who live in the territory of Afghanistan. This is a nil result, not to say a negative one,” Putin said to teenagers at an educational facility in Russia.
Putin, who has previously said Russia has no plans to deploy troops to the country the Soviet Union once occupied but then was forced to retreat from in 1988 and 1989, claimed the U.S. approach to Afghanistan was flawed in that it tried to instill Western norms on Afghan people.
It is “impossible to impose anything from outside,” he said.
Russia, as well as China, have not yet formally recognized the Taliban as Afghanistan’s legitimate governing power but have generally shown more of a willingness to work with the militant group than have other nations.
-ABC News’ Tanya Stukalova
Sep 01, 11:44 am
Sole province uncontrolled by Taliban fights for independence
The Panjshir Valley, around 60 miles of mountain terrain in north-central Afghanistan, is the only one of 34 provinces in the country not controlled by the Taliban, and the people of Panjshir have vowed to continue the fight.
Anti-Taliban forces were seen in Panjshir on Wednesday conducting military exercises and patrolling hilltops as attempts to bring the Taliban and people of Panjishir to talks have reportedly failed.
It’s unclear how many, but a number of Afghans have traveled to the region in hopes of sanctuary in what’s become a holdout for rebel fighters and known as a “historical heartland of resistance.”
Taliban General Mobin Khan said earlier this month that the Taliban are “trying to resolve the issue through talks, and Panjshir may surrender peacefully — otherwise, the responsibility for the war lies with the short-sighted.”
-ABC News’ Sohel Uddin and Guy Davies
Sep 01, 11:37 am
Taliban hold parade in Kandahar, urge civilians to stay
Taliban forces have rallied around the country to celebrate the withdrawal of U.S. ground forces, holding a parade of vehicles in the Kandahar province on Wednesday.
Haji Mohammad Yousaf, the Taliban’s governor in Kandahar, and Taliban spokesperson Zabihullah Mujahid spoke to Afghans gathered at the event.
Meanwhile, in Kabul, scenes around an abandoned airport area, where crowds of Afghans civilians once gathered around U.S. troops, showed empty vehicles covered in barbed wire as Taliban fighters have taken control of the airport and its perimeter.
In an interview with “Good Morning Britain” on Wednesday, Taliban spokesperson Dr. Suhail Shaheen said those with the right documents will be allowed to leave Afghanistan, but “urged” them to stay.
-ABC News’ Guy Davies
Sep 01, 10:26 am
Taliban celebrates US departure
With all U.S. ground troops out of Afghanistan, scenes around Hamid Karzai International Airport in Kabul on Wednesday showed Taliban fighters in Afghan National Army uniforms after the militant group seized the airport, with some firing celebratory gunshots into the air — a far different picture from the days preceding.
Hours before Biden addressed the nation on Tuesday and firmly defended the U.S. withdrawal from Afghanistan, the Taliban held a mock funeral in Kabul with show caskets draped with U.S., U.K. and French flags to symbolize what it has called the defeat of NATO allies after 20 years.
The Taliban also released a video overnight they say shows their troops flying over the Kandahar province in an Afghan military helicopter as the militant group works to maintain a hold on the country.
A defiant Biden on Tuesday said that he refused to extend a “forever war” and would not be “extending a forever exit.” The president on Wednesday is meeting with Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy and does not have any Afghanistan-related briefings on his public schedule.
Aug 31, 6:53 pm
1st plane to bring aid since Taliban took control landed Monday
As the U.S. prepared to evacuate from Kabul airport Monday, the World Health Organization flew a plane into the country with desperately needed aid.
On Monday, 12.5 metric tons of urgent medical supplies were flown from WHO’s warehouse in Dubai to Mazar-i-Sharif airport — not to Kabul, because of the “ongoing disruptions” there, according to WHO.
This is the first medical aid plane to land in Afghanistan since the Taliban took control, according to WHO — and it comes amid a growing need and deteriorating conditions.
“WHO is exploring more options to get further shipments into the country until a reliable humanitarian airbridge to scale-up collective humanitarian effort is established,” the UN agency said in a statement.
Aug 31, 6:17 pm
Top enlisted service member tells troops their service mattered
The military’s top enlisted service member sent a message to U.S. troops reassuring them that their service in Afghanistan mattered.
“You can hold your head high that we prevented an attack on the United States homeland,” writes Ramon Colon-Lopez, the senior enlisted adviser to the chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff.
“To each of you, your service mattered,” he added. “This is personal to us, and we know it is personal to every one of you.”
He also praised those involved in the massive airlift from Afghanistan.
“Your actions honor the sacrifice of our brothers and sisters in arms who lost their lives or were wounded in Afghanistan,” he wrote. “Over the last two decades and the last 2 weeks. you embodied our American values of equality, liberty, and human dignity for all.”
Aug 31, 5:53 pm
US-funded journalists left behind, no updates on airport talks, overland routes
Some 500 Afghan journalists and their families who were employed by the U.S. Agency for Global Media (USAGM) were left behind in Afghanistan — reporters, producers and more who worked for Voice of America and other U.S.-funded outlets, according to the top Republican on the House Foreign Affairs Committee.
“We did not forget about USAGM employees and their families, nor will we. These individuals … have not only worked for us, they have worked with us,” said State Department spokesperson Ned Price. “We remain keenly focused on getting them out safely just as soon as we can.”
Price wouldn’t confirm how many there are or what the plans to evacuate them may be, saying it was “not prudent for us to speak to tactics.”
He cited the same reason for declining to say more about how the U.S. may help some Americans travel on overland routes to escape Afghanistan, saying only that it “reinforces the point that we’re looking at all available options to bring Americans to safety.”
Price also had no status update on the negotiations to reopen Kabul’s airport, no update on how many American citizens remain in Afghanistan and no update on a protecting power — a country that oversees U.S. interests where there is no embassy, like Switzerland in Iran or the Czech Republic in Syria.
Major General Chris Donahue, commander of the U.S. Army 82nd Airborne Division, XVIII Airborne Corps, boards a C-17 cargo plane at the Hamid Karzai International Airport in Kabul, Afghanistan. Maj. Gen. Donahue is the final American service member to depart Afghanistan, Aug. 30, 2021. – U.S. Central Command
(KABUL, Afghanistan) — With the U.S. military and diplomatic withdrawal now complete after 20 years in Afghanistan, the Taliban has taken over the country, including the Kabul airport, the site of an often-desperate evacuation effort the past two weeks.
But even as the last American troops were flown out to meet President Joe Biden’s Aug. 31 deadline, other Americans who wanted to flee the country were left behind and the Biden administration is now focused on a “diplomatic mission” to help them leave.
When President Joe Biden sat down with ABC News’ George Stephanopoulos for an exclusive one-on-one interview at the White House on Aug. 18, he said he was committed to keeping the U.S. military in Afghanistan as long as needed. “If there are American citizens left, we’re going to stay until we get them all out,” he said.
Here are the latest developments. All times Eastern:
Sep 01, 10:26 am
Taliban celebrates US departure
With all U.S. ground troops out of Afghanistan, scenes around Hamid Karzai International Airport in Kabul on Wednesday showed Taliban fighters in Afghan National Army uniforms after the militant group seized the airport, with some firing celebratory gunshots into the air — a far different picture from the days preceding.
Hours before Biden addressed the nation on Tuesday and firmly defended the U.S. withdrawal from Afghanistan, the Taliban held a mock funeral in Kabul with show caskets draped with U.S., U.K. and French flags to symbolize what it has called the defeat of NATO allies after 20 years.
The Taliban also released a video overnight they say shows their troops flying over the Kandahar province in an Afghan military helicopter as the militant group works to maintain a hold on the country.
A defiant Biden on Tuesday said that he refused to extend a “forever war” and would not be “extending a forever exit.” The president on Wednesday is meeting with Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy and does not have any Afghanistan-related briefings on his public schedule.
Aug 31, 6:53 pm
1st plane to bring aid since Taliban took control landed Monday
As the U.S. prepared to evacuate from Kabul airport Monday, the World Health Organization flew a plane into the country with desperately needed aid.
On Monday, 12.5 metric tons of urgent medical supplies were flown from WHO’s warehouse in Dubai to Mazar-i-Sharif airport — not to Kabul, because of the “ongoing disruptions” there, according to WHO.
This is the first medical aid plane to land in Afghanistan since the Taliban took control, according to WHO — and it comes amid a growing need and deteriorating conditions.
“WHO is exploring more options to get further shipments into the country until a reliable humanitarian airbridge to scale-up collective humanitarian effort is established,” the UN agency said in a statement.
Aug 31, 6:17 pm
Top enlisted service member tells troops their service mattered
The military’s top enlisted service member sent a message to U.S. troops reassuring them that their service in Afghanistan mattered.
“You can hold your head high that we prevented an attack on the United States homeland,” writes Ramon Colon-Lopez, the senior enlisted adviser to the chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff.
“To each of you, your service mattered,” he added. “This is personal to us, and we know it is personal to every one of you.”
He also praised those involved in the massive airlift from Afghanistan.
“Your actions honor the sacrifice of our brothers and sisters in arms who lost their lives or were wounded in Afghanistan,” he wrote. “Over the last two decades and the last 2 weeks. you embodied our American values of equality, liberty, and human dignity for all.”
Aug 31, 5:53 pm
US-funded journalists left behind, no updates on airport talks, overland routes
Some 500 Afghan journalists and their families who were employed by the U.S. Agency for Global Media (USAGM) were left behind in Afghanistan — reporters, producers and more who worked for Voice of America and other U.S.-funded outlets, according to the top Republican on the House Foreign Affairs Committee.
“We did not forget about USAGM employees and their families, nor will we. These individuals … have not only worked for us, they have worked with us,” said State Department spokesperson Ned Price. “We remain keenly focused on getting them out safely just as soon as we can.”
Price wouldn’t confirm how many there are or what the plans to evacuate them may be, saying it was “not prudent for us to speak to tactics.”
He cited the same reason for declining to say more about how the U.S. may help some Americans travel on overland routes to escape Afghanistan, saying only that it “reinforces the point that we’re looking at all available options to bring Americans to safety.”
Price also had no status update on the negotiations to reopen Kabul’s airport, no update on how many American citizens remain in Afghanistan and no update on a protecting power — a country that oversees U.S. interests where there is no embassy, like Switzerland in Iran or the Czech Republic in Syria.
Major General Chris Donahue, commander of the U.S. Army 82nd Airborne Division, XVIII Airborne Corps, boards a C-17 cargo plane at the Hamid Karzai International Airport in Kabul, Afghanistan. Maj. Gen. Donahue is the final American service member to depart Afghanistan, Aug. 30, 2021. – U.S. Central Command
(KABUL, Afghanistan) — With the U.S. military and diplomatic withdrawal now complete after 20 years in Afghanistan, the Taliban has taken over the country, including the Kabul airport, the site of an often-desperate evacuation effort the past two weeks.
But even as the last American troops were flown out to meet President Joe Biden’s Aug. 31 deadline, other Americans who wanted to flee the country were left behind and the Biden administration is now focused on a “diplomatic mission” to help them leave.
When President Joe Biden sat down with ABC News’ George Stephanopoulos for an exclusive one-on-one interview at the White House on Aug. 18, he said he was committed to keeping the U.S. military in Afghanistan as long as needed. “If there are American citizens left, we’re going to stay until we get them all out,” he said.
Here are the latest developments. All times Eastern.
Aug 31, 4:18 pm
President claims US prepared to handle collapse of Afghan military, government
Biden said the decision to depart Afghanistan by Aug. 31 was predicated on the “assumption” that the Afghan government “would be able to hold on for a period of time beyond military drawdown.”
“The assumption was that more than 300,000 Afghan national security forces that we had trained over the past two decades and equipped would be a strong adversary in their civil wars with the Taliban,” Biden said. “That assumption, that the Afghan government would be able to hold on for a period of time beyond military drawdown, turned out not to be accurate.”
Aug 31, 3:51 pm
‘It was time to end this war’: Biden
In his address to the nation, the president said it was time to end the war.
“We succeeded in what we set out to do in Afghanistan over a decade ago. Then we stayed for another decade. It was time to end this war,” he said. “This is a new world: Al-Qaida affiliates in Syria and ISIS attempting to create a caliphate in Syria and Iraq and establishing affiliates across Africa nation. The fundamental obligation of a president, in my opinion, is to defend and protect America. Not against threats of 2001 but against the threats of 2021 and tomorrow.”
“That is the guiding principle behind my decisions about Afghanistan,” he added. “I simply do not believe that the safety and security of America is enhanced by continuing to deploy thousands of American troops and sending billions of dollars.”
Aug 31, 3:51 pm
Biden says 90% of Americans who wanted to leave were able to leave
Biden touted efforts to get out Afghans who helped the U.S. mission in Afghanistan and said, “Now we believe that about 100 to 200 Americans remain in Afghanistan, with some intention to leave.”
“Most of those who remain are dual citizens, long-time residents who had earlier decided to stay because of their family roots in Afghanistan,” Biden said. “The bottom line, 90% of Americans in Afghanistan who wanted to leave were able to leave. And for those remaining Americans, there is no deadline. We remain committed to get them out if they want to come out.”
“90% of Americans in Afghanistan who wanted to leave were able to leave,” Pres. Biden says.
In his first formal remarks since the U.S. military withdrew from Afghanistan, the president said, “The extraordinary success of this mission was due to the incredible skill, bravery and selfless courage of the United States military and our diplomats and intelligence professionals.”
“For weeks they risked their lives to get American citizens Afghans who helped us, citizens of our allies and partners and others onboard planes and out of the country,” he continued. “And they did it facing a crush of enormous crowds seeking to leave the country. And they did it knowing ISIS-K terrorists, sworn enemies of the Taliban were lurking in the midst of those crowds.”
Pres. Biden on U.S. troop withdrawal from Afghanistan: “The extraordinary success of this mission was due to the incredible skill, bravery, and selfless courage of the United States military and our diplomats and intelligence professionals.” https://t.co/dpSzkC2n0kpic.twitter.com/Su2JqZT8Vw
McConnell blasts Biden for breaking promise, leaving Americans behind
Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell criticized President Biden, claiming he broke his “promise” to get every American who wanted to leave Afghanistan out of the country before the U.S. military left, saying Biden’s “reckless withdrawal has created a humanitarian disaster and emboldened the terrorists.”
“Two weeks ago, President Biden specifically promised he wouldn’t pull out before every American who wanted out had gotten out. By their own admission, the Biden Administration has now broken that promise,” McConnell said Tuesday at an event in Ashland, Kentucky.
In an exclusive interview on Aug. 18 with ABC’s George Stephanopolous, Biden said that “If there’s American citizens left, we’re gonna stay to get them all out.”
At the event, McConnell also warned of the continued threat from the Taliban, adding, “This fight will not end just because our politicians want it to go away.”
Aug 31, 2:19 pm
Scenes from Kabul the day after the US military withdrawal
Scenes around Hamid Karzai International Airport in Kabul on Tuesday showed Taliban fighters appearing to wear Afghan National Army uniforms after the militant group took control of the airport following the U.S. military’s full withdrawal from the country — a far different picture from the days preceding.
Resources left behind in the wake of mass evacuations, including equipment stamped with American and Afghan national flags, littered the area where U.S. troops recently stood guard. Taliban fighters have apparently since seized some equipment distributed to the Afghan army by the U.S. before it collapsed.
As the 20-year war came to a close on Monday, the Pentagon said that the cost, in human lives, was 2,461 troops killed and more than 20,000 injured.
Since the evacuation mission began, 6,000 citizens and more than 123,000 people — Afghan “friends and allies” — were flown out of Afghanistan by the U.S. and partners, but 100 to 200 American citizens still wanting to leave remain, officials said, as well as thousands of Afghans who worked with the U.S. and fear reprisal from the Taliban.
Aug 31, 2:02 pm
House GOP promising investigation into Biden’s withdrawal decision
GOP Rep. Michael McCaul, R-Texas, said Republicans had sent letters to the Department of Defense, the Department of State and the intelligence community asking agencies to preserve documents relating to the Afghanistan withdrawal for what they said would be a future investigation.
“We want the Democrats to join us but we are going to do it with or without, exercising our constitutional authority of oversight to get to the bottom of how this got so wrong,” McCaul, the top Republican on the House Foreign Affairs Committee said at a news conference on Capitol Hill Tuesday.
The announcement comes after House Minority Leader Kevin McCarthy said Friday there would be “a day of reckoning” for Biden, promising an investigation into the withdrawal. Other GOP House members criticized Biden’s withdrawal, with Rep. Mike Rogers, R-Mich., saying “this disaster is solely the responsibility” of Biden, Secretary of State Anthony Blinken and national security adviser Jake Sullivan.
House GOP leader Kevin McCarthy criticizes Pres. Biden’s decision to withdraw troops from Afghanistan: “Never in my lifetime would I ever believe America would have an administration knowingly make a decision to leave Americans behind.” https://t.co/99AMR8vJTBpic.twitter.com/QxbUS4dbwj
Harris presides over Senate passage of bill assisting Americans fleeing Afghanistan
Vice President Kamala Harris gaveled in a pro forma session of the Senate on Tuesday morning, to enable the passage of a bill that will help with the repatriation of Americans coming from Afghanistan, according to a White House aide.
The bill provides emergency, temporary assistance for Americans returning from Afghanistan. It was passed without any objection at roughly 10:30 a.m. and will now head to the president’s desk since it originated in and already passed the House.
Secretary of State Antony Blinken said on Monday there is still a “small number of Americans — under 200, and likely closer to 100 — who remain in Afghanistan and want to leave.”
Aug 31, 10:18 am
Taliban spokesperson congratulates nation on ‘freedom,’ American defeat
Taliban spokesperson Zabihullah Mujahid told Taliban soldiers at a press conference hours after the last U.S. soldiers left the airport in Kabul that they had secured victory for the whole of the Afghan nation.
“Due to the sincerity, perseverance, and patience of our elders, we gained our freedom. I congratulate all of you and our nation on this freedom, and I hope that Afghanistan will never be occupied and that it will be free, prosperous, and the home of Afghans, and that there will be an Islamic government,” he said, according to a translation of his remarks from Reuters.
Mujahid said the Taliban wanted to sustain good relations with the rest of the world, that Afghanistan was not a country for occupying forces, and that Americans were defeated and could not achieve their goals.
“The nation has suffered a lot, and they have been repressed because of the occupation, have seen problems for 20 years, and can no longer tolerate misbehavior. Therefore, I call on all our militaries to treat the people well because the people have the right to peace, to unite, and we are the servants of the nation, not to dominate the people,” he said.
Aug 31, 10:04 am
Biden to defend Afghanistan withdrawal in speech to nation
President Biden is expected to defend his decision on Afghanistan when he speaks at 2:45 p.m. from the White House — a day after the last U.S. troops left in accordance with his self-imposed deadline but also while other Americans who wanted to leave were left behind to deal with an uncertain fate.
In an exclusive interview with George Stephanopoulos on ABC’s “Good Morning America,” Biden’s national security adviser Jake Sullivan offered more defense for the administration’s handling of the Afghanistan withdrawal, perhaps foreshadowing Biden’s remarks this afternoon.
Though Stephanopoulos pressed him for details on the plan to evacuate the remaining Americans, which Secretary of State Antony Blinken said is “under 200,” Sullivan repeated they will use “every available diplomatic means with the economic leverage that we have,” but he did attempt to take credit for the successful evacuations — and even pinned some of the blame on the remaining Americans who weren’t able to make it out.
“We do believe that there is an important dimension of humanitarian assistance that should go directly to the people of Afghanistan.”
“We got out between 5,500 and 6,000 people — Americans from Afghanistan — we got out 97 or 98% of those on the ground and the small number who remain, we contacted repeatedly over the course of two weeks to come to the airport to come to a rally point. 5,500 or more did that,” Sullivan said.
In response to criticism from many Republicans lawmakers like Arkansas Sen. Tom Cotton, Sullivan contended that only the president, as commander in chief, knows what it is to make these hard decisions.
“Those criticizing are not the ones who have to sit in the Situation Room and make the hard calls about the threats that we face and the objectives we’re trying to obtain and President Biden made that hard call and it is a call he believes will ultimately serve the interests of our people, all of our citizens and our country,” he said.
He also insisted aid will not be given to the Taliban unless they adhere to international obligations.
“It will be about whether they follow through on their commitments, their commitments to safe passage for Americans and Afghan allies. Their commitment to not allow Afghanistan to be a base from which terrorists can attack the United States or any other country,” Sullivan said.
Aug 30, 9:19 pm
Taliban wield American-supplied equipment, uniforms after withdrawal
Moments after the last U.S. troops withdrew from Afghanistan, Taliban fighters entered the Kabul airport, wielding American-supplied weapons, equipment and even uniforms.
Aug 30, 8:59 pm
Military releases image of last soldier out of Afghanistan
U.S. Army Maj. Gen. Chris Donahue, of the 82nd Airborne Division, was the last American service member to depart Afghanistan, according to Gen. Kenneth McKenzie, the commander of U.S. Central Command.
“On the last plane out was General Chris Donahue, the commander of the 82nd Airborne Division and my ground commander, and he was accompanied by our — our charge d’affaires, Ambassador Ross Wilson, so they came out together,” McKenzie said at the Pentagon briefing. “So the state and defense team came out on the last aircraft and were in fact the last people to step on the ground.”
Aug 30, 8:04 pm
US engaging Taliban, but not recognizing it
Secretary of State Antony Blinken said the U.S. will continue to engage the Taliban going forward — engagement that will be “driven by one thing only — our vital national interest.”
“The Taliban seeks international legitimacy and support. Our message is any legitimacy and any support will have to be earned,” he said. “The Taliban can do that by meeting commitments and obligations on freedom of travel; respecting the basic rights of the Afghan people, including women and minorities; upholding its commitments on counter-terrorism; not carrying out reprisal violence against those who choose to stay in Afghanistan; and forming an inclusive government that can meet the needs and reflect the aspirations of the Afghan people.”
But the Taliban have already violated many of those — denying freedom of travel to some, violating their commitments on counter-terrorism, carrying out reprisal violence and more.
Aug 30, 7:37 pm
Commitment to Afghans who worked with US ‘has no deadline’: Blinken
For Afghans who worked alongside the U.S. who wanted to leave but weren’t able to get out, the U.S. would continue to try to help them, Secretary of State Antony Blinken said in remarks Monday evening.
“Our commitment to them has no deadline,” he said.
To that end, he thanked Qatar and Turkey for trying to make the Kabul airport operational soon, allowing safe passage to these people.
“This would enable a small number of daily charter flights, which is a key for anyone who wants to depart from Afghanistan moving forward,” Blinken said. “We’re also working to identify ways to support Americans, legal permanent residents and Afghans who have worked with us to depart via land routes.”
But he tempered expectations.
“We have no illusion that any of this will be easy,” Blinken said. “Or rapid. This will be an entirely different phase from the evacuation that just concluded. It will take time to work through a new set of challenges.”
Aug 30, 5:01 pm
Number of Americans left in Afghanistan in the ‘low 100s’
There are still Americans left in Afghanistan that the United States is trying to get out of the country, Gen. Kenneth McKenzie, the commander of U.S. Central Command, said.
“I believe our Department of State is going to work very hard to allow any American citizens that are left, and we think the citizens that were not brought outnumber in the low — very low 100s,” McKenzie said. “I believe that we’re going to be able to get those people out.”
There were no evacuees left at the airport when the last U.S. flight left, he said.
McKenzie also said the U.S. would also “negotiate very hard, and very aggressively, to get our other Afghan partners out.”
Aug 30, 4:35 pm
All US troops have departed Afghanistan: Pentagon
All U.S. troops have departed Afghanistan, according to the Department of Defense, concluding America’s military ground presence there and its longest war.
Gen. Frank McKenzie, the head of U.S. Central Command, made the announcement from the headquarters at MacDill Air Force Base, in Tampa, Florida, after being introduced in the Pentagon Briefing Room by press secretary John Kirby.
Acknowledging that the withdrawal has been completed, McKenzie said the last U.S. military plane has cleared Afghan airspace.
He said that the U.S. military’s 20-year mission in Afghanistan is over.
Major General Chris Donahue, commander of the U.S. Army 82nd Airborne Division, XVIII Airborne Corps, boards a C-17 cargo plane at the Hamid Karzai International Airport in Kabul, Afghanistan. Maj. Gen. Donahue is the final American service member to depart Afghanistan, Aug. 30, 2021. – U.S. Central Command
(KABUL, Afghanistan) — With the U.S. military and diplomatic withdrawal now complete after 20 years in Afghanistan, the Taliban has taken over the country, including the Kabul airport, the site of an often-desperate evacuation effort the past two weeks.
But even as the last American troops were flown out to meet President Joe Biden’s Aug. 31 deadline, other Americans who wanted to flee the country were left behind and the Biden administration is now focused on a “diplomatic mission” to help them leave.
When President Joe Biden sat down with ABC News’ George Stephanopoulos for an exclusive one-on-one interview at the White House on Aug. 18, he said he was committed to keeping the U.S. military in Afghanistan as long as needed. “If there are American citizens left, we’re going to stay until we get them all out,” he said.
Here are the latest developments. All times Eastern.
Aug 31, 3:51 pm
‘It was time to end this war’: Biden
In his address to the nation, the president said it was time to end the war.
“We succeeded in what we set out to do in Afghanistan over a decade ago. Then we stayed for another decade. It was time to end this war,” he said. “This is a new world: Al-Qaida affiliates in Syria and ISIS attempting to create a caliphate in Syria and Iraq and establishing affiliates across Africa nation. The fundamental obligation of a president, in my opinion, is to defend and protect America. Not against threats of 2001 but against the threats of 2021 and tomorrow.”
“That is the guiding principle behind my decisions about Afghanistan,” he added. “I simply do not believe that the safety and security of America is enhanced by continuing to deploy thousands of American troops and sending billions of dollars.”
Aug 31, 3:51 pm
Biden says 90% of Americans who wanted to leave were able to leave
Biden touted efforts to get out Afghans who helped the U.S. mission in Afghanistan and said, “Now we believe that about 100 to 200 Americans remain in Afghanistan, with some intention to leave.”
“Most of those who remain are dual citizens, long-time residents who had earlier decided to stay because of their family roots in Afghanistan,” Biden said. “The bottom line, 90% of Americans in Afghanistan who wanted to leave were able to leave. And for those remaining Americans, there is no deadline. We remain committed to get them out if they want to come out.”
“90% of Americans in Afghanistan who wanted to leave were able to leave,” Pres. Biden says.
In his first formal remarks since the U.S. military withdrew from Afghanistan, the president said, “The extraordinary success of this mission was due to the incredible skill, bravery and selfless courage of the United States military and our diplomats and intelligence professionals.”
“For weeks they risked their lives to get American citizens Afghans who helped us, citizens of our allies and partners and others onboard planes and out of the country,” he continued. “And they did it facing a crush of enormous crowds seeking to leave the country. And they did it knowing ISIS-K terrorists, sworn enemies of the Taliban were lurking in the midst of those crowds.”
Pres. Biden on U.S. troop withdrawal from Afghanistan: “The extraordinary success of this mission was due to the incredible skill, bravery, and selfless courage of the United States military and our diplomats and intelligence professionals.” https://t.co/dpSzkC2n0kpic.twitter.com/Su2JqZT8Vw
McConnell blasts Biden for breaking promise, leaving Americans behind
Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell criticized President Biden, claiming he broke his “promise” to get every American who wanted to leave Afghanistan out of the country before the U.S. military left, saying Biden’s “reckless withdrawal has created a humanitarian disaster and emboldened the terrorists.”
“Two weeks ago, President Biden specifically promised he wouldn’t pull out before every American who wanted out had gotten out. By their own admission, the Biden Administration has now broken that promise,” McConnell said Tuesday at an event in Ashland, Kentucky.
In an exclusive interview on Aug. 18 with ABC’s George Stephanopolous, Biden said that “If there’s American citizens left, we’re gonna stay to get them all out.”
At the event, McConnell also warned of the continued threat from the Taliban, adding, “This fight will not end just because our politicians want it to go away.”
Aug 31, 2:19 pm
Scenes from Kabul the day after the US military withdrawal
Scenes around Hamid Karzai International Airport in Kabul on Tuesday showed Taliban fighters appearing to wear Afghan National Army uniforms after the militant group took control of the airport following the U.S. military’s full withdrawal from the country — a far different picture from the days preceding.
Resources left behind in the wake of mass evacuations, including equipment stamped with American and Afghan national flags, littered the area where U.S. troops recently stood guard. Taliban fighters have apparently since seized some equipment distributed to the Afghan army by the U.S. before it collapsed.
As the 20-year war came to a close on Monday, the Pentagon said that the cost, in human lives, was 2,461 troops killed and more than 20,000 injured.
Since the evacuation mission began, 6,000 citizens and more than 123,000 people — Afghan “friends and allies” — were flown out of Afghanistan by the U.S. and partners, but 100 to 200 American citizens still wanting to leave remain, officials said, as well as thousands of Afghans who worked with the U.S. and fear reprisal from the Taliban.
Aug 31, 2:02 pm
House GOP promising investigation into Biden’s withdrawal decision
GOP Rep. Michael McCaul, R-Texas, said Republicans had sent letters to the Department of Defense, the Department of State and the intelligence community asking agencies to preserve documents relating to the Afghanistan withdrawal for what they said would be a future investigation.
“We want the Democrats to join us but we are going to do it with or without, exercising our constitutional authority of oversight to get to the bottom of how this got so wrong,” McCaul, the top Republican on the House Foreign Affairs Committee said at a news conference on Capitol Hill Tuesday.
The announcement comes after House Minority Leader Kevin McCarthy said Friday there would be “a day of reckoning” for Biden, promising an investigation into the withdrawal. Other GOP House members criticized Biden’s withdrawal, with Rep. Mike Rogers, R-Mich., saying “this disaster is solely the responsibility” of Biden, Secretary of State Anthony Blinken and national security adviser Jake Sullivan.
House GOP leader Kevin McCarthy criticizes Pres. Biden’s decision to withdraw troops from Afghanistan: “Never in my lifetime would I ever believe America would have an administration knowingly make a decision to leave Americans behind.” https://t.co/99AMR8vJTBpic.twitter.com/QxbUS4dbwj
Harris presides over Senate passage of bill assisting Americans fleeing Afghanistan
Vice President Kamala Harris gaveled in a pro forma session of the Senate on Tuesday morning, to enable the passage of a bill that will help with the repatriation of Americans coming from Afghanistan, according to a White House aide.
The bill provides emergency, temporary assistance for Americans returning from Afghanistan. It was passed without any objection at roughly 10:30 a.m. and will now head to the president’s desk since it originated in and already passed the House.
Secretary of State Antony Blinken said on Monday there is still a “small number of Americans — under 200, and likely closer to 100 — who remain in Afghanistan and want to leave.”
Aug 31, 10:18 am
Taliban spokesperson congratulates nation on ‘freedom,’ American defeat
Taliban spokesperson Zabihullah Mujahid told Taliban soldiers at a press conference hours after the last U.S. soldiers left the airport in Kabul that they had secured victory for the whole of the Afghan nation.
“Due to the sincerity, perseverance, and patience of our elders, we gained our freedom. I congratulate all of you and our nation on this freedom, and I hope that Afghanistan will never be occupied and that it will be free, prosperous, and the home of Afghans, and that there will be an Islamic government,” he said, according to a translation of his remarks from Reuters.
Mujahid said the Taliban wanted to sustain good relations with the rest of the world, that Afghanistan was not a country for occupying forces, and that Americans were defeated and could not achieve their goals.
“The nation has suffered a lot, and they have been repressed because of the occupation, have seen problems for 20 years, and can no longer tolerate misbehavior. Therefore, I call on all our militaries to treat the people well because the people have the right to peace, to unite, and we are the servants of the nation, not to dominate the people,” he said.
Aug 31, 10:04 am
Biden to defend Afghanistan withdrawal in speech to nation
President Biden is expected to defend his decision on Afghanistan when he speaks at 2:45 p.m. from the White House — a day after the last U.S. troops left in accordance with his self-imposed deadline but also while other Americans who wanted to leave were left behind to deal with an uncertain fate.
In an exclusive interview with George Stephanopoulos on ABC’s “Good Morning America,” Biden’s national security adviser Jake Sullivan offered more defense for the administration’s handling of the Afghanistan withdrawal, perhaps foreshadowing Biden’s remarks this afternoon.
Though Stephanopoulos pressed him for details on the plan to evacuate the remaining Americans, which Secretary of State Antony Blinken said is “under 200,” Sullivan repeated they will use “every available diplomatic means with the economic leverage that we have,” but he did attempt to take credit for the successful evacuations — and even pinned some of the blame on the remaining Americans who weren’t able to make it out.
“We do believe that there is an important dimension of humanitarian assistance that should go directly to the people of Afghanistan.”
“We got out between 5,500 and 6,000 people — Americans from Afghanistan — we got out 97 or 98% of those on the ground and the small number who remain, we contacted repeatedly over the course of two weeks to come to the airport to come to a rally point. 5,500 or more did that,” Sullivan said.
In response to criticism from many Republicans lawmakers like Arkansas Sen. Tom Cotton, Sullivan contended that only the president, as commander in chief, knows what it is to make these hard decisions.
“Those criticizing are not the ones who have to sit in the Situation Room and make the hard calls about the threats that we face and the objectives we’re trying to obtain and President Biden made that hard call and it is a call he believes will ultimately serve the interests of our people, all of our citizens and our country,” he said.
He also insisted aid will not be given to the Taliban unless they adhere to international obligations.
“It will be about whether they follow through on their commitments, their commitments to safe passage for Americans and Afghan allies. Their commitment to not allow Afghanistan to be a base from which terrorists can attack the United States or any other country,” Sullivan said.
Aug 30, 9:19 pm
Taliban wield American-supplied equipment, uniforms after withdrawal
Moments after the last U.S. troops withdrew from Afghanistan, Taliban fighters entered the Kabul airport, wielding American-supplied weapons, equipment and even uniforms.
Aug 30, 8:59 pm
Military releases image of last soldier out of Afghanistan
U.S. Army Maj. Gen. Chris Donahue, of the 82nd Airborne Division, was the last American service member to depart Afghanistan, according to Gen. Kenneth McKenzie, the commander of U.S. Central Command.
“On the last plane out was General Chris Donahue, the commander of the 82nd Airborne Division and my ground commander, and he was accompanied by our — our charge d’affaires, Ambassador Ross Wilson, so they came out together,” McKenzie said at the Pentagon briefing. “So the state and defense team came out on the last aircraft and were in fact the last people to step on the ground.”
Aug 30, 8:04 pm
US engaging Taliban, but not recognizing it
Secretary of State Antony Blinken said the U.S. will continue to engage the Taliban going forward — engagement that will be “driven by one thing only — our vital national interest.”
“The Taliban seeks international legitimacy and support. Our message is any legitimacy and any support will have to be earned,” he said. “The Taliban can do that by meeting commitments and obligations on freedom of travel; respecting the basic rights of the Afghan people, including women and minorities; upholding its commitments on counter-terrorism; not carrying out reprisal violence against those who choose to stay in Afghanistan; and forming an inclusive government that can meet the needs and reflect the aspirations of the Afghan people.”
But the Taliban have already violated many of those — denying freedom of travel to some, violating their commitments on counter-terrorism, carrying out reprisal violence and more.
Aug 30, 7:37 pm
Commitment to Afghans who worked with US ‘has no deadline’: Blinken
For Afghans who worked alongside the U.S. who wanted to leave but weren’t able to get out, the U.S. would continue to try to help them, Secretary of State Antony Blinken said in remarks Monday evening.
“Our commitment to them has no deadline,” he said.
To that end, he thanked Qatar and Turkey for trying to make the Kabul airport operational soon, allowing safe passage to these people.
“This would enable a small number of daily charter flights, which is a key for anyone who wants to depart from Afghanistan moving forward,” Blinken said. “We’re also working to identify ways to support Americans, legal permanent residents and Afghans who have worked with us to depart via land routes.”
But he tempered expectations.
“We have no illusion that any of this will be easy,” Blinken said. “Or rapid. This will be an entirely different phase from the evacuation that just concluded. It will take time to work through a new set of challenges.”
Aug 30, 5:01 pm
Number of Americans left in Afghanistan in the ‘low 100s’
There are still Americans left in Afghanistan that the United States is trying to get out of the country, Gen. Kenneth McKenzie, the commander of U.S. Central Command, said.
“I believe our Department of State is going to work very hard to allow any American citizens that are left, and we think the citizens that were not brought outnumber in the low — very low 100s,” McKenzie said. “I believe that we’re going to be able to get those people out.”
There were no evacuees left at the airport when the last U.S. flight left, he said.
McKenzie also said the U.S. would also “negotiate very hard, and very aggressively, to get our other Afghan partners out.”
Aug 30, 4:35 pm
All US troops have departed Afghanistan: Pentagon
All U.S. troops have departed Afghanistan, according to the Department of Defense, concluding America’s military ground presence there and its longest war.
Gen. Frank McKenzie, the head of U.S. Central Command, made the announcement from the headquarters at MacDill Air Force Base, in Tampa, Florida, after being introduced in the Pentagon Briefing Room by press secretary John Kirby.
Acknowledging that the withdrawal has been completed, McKenzie said the last U.S. military plane has cleared Afghan airspace.
He said that the U.S. military’s 20-year mission in Afghanistan is over.
(NEW YORK) — A group of Afghans has been trapped for three weeks at the edge of a forest on the border between Poland and Belarus, caught in a no man’s land between Polish security forces who will not let them enter Poland and Belarusian troops who won’t let them turn back.
The situation of the 32 Afghans—short of food and some seriously ill, according to local activists—has attracted intense attention in Poland and internationally.
The standoff is a result of the surge in migrants arriving at the European Union’s borders that has been engineered by Belarus’ authoritarian leader Alexander Lukashenko as suspected retaliation against the bloc for its support for the pro-democracy movement that has called for him to step down.
European officials have accused Belarus’ authorities of flying in migrants and then funneling them to its western borders with the goal of orchestrating a migration crisis meant to pressure its European neighbors. So far this year, over 4,000 people—mainly from Iraq and Afghanistan—have illegally crossed from Belarus into neighboring Lithuania. That is 50 times more than all of 2020, according to officials. Poland, which is far larger than Lithuania, recorded over 3,000 illegal crossings since the start of August.
The governments of Lithuania and Poland have said they cannot absorb the influx and hurriedly deployed more security officers and put up a new border fence. The Polish government on Tuesday announced it was seeking a state of emergency for the border zone. The Belarusian security forces meanwhile have been filmed in full riot gear trying to force migrants back toward the border after they are turned back.
The 32 Afghans trapped at the border at Usnarz Górny have found themselves caught in the middle. Last week, Fundacja Ocalenie, a Polish charity that works with refugees, and an opposition member of parliament managed to pass them tents, food and clothing, but since then Polish border guards have blocked them from approaching the group, a spokeswoman for the charity said.
“It is terrible conditions,” said Marianna Warteska, the spokeswoman, told ABC News by phone from close to the border. “They are not receiving any kind of medical assistance—their health is deteriorating.”
She said the group was drinking unclean water from a nearby stream and surviving off bread delivered by the Belarusian guards every couple of days. The volunteers have been communicating with the Afghans via megaphone, she said, but Polish guards would often turn on their vehicle engines and sirens to try to drown them out.
Eight of the Afghans were suffering from kidney issues and five had diarrhea, according to Warteska. She said one 26-year-old man lost consciousness for 20 minutes on Thursday but the border guards refused to call an ambulance. She warned another woman in her fifties has been unable to leave her tent for several days.
A spokeswoman for Poland’s border service on Tuesday declined to comment to ABC News.
Warteska said all 32 Afghans had expressed a desire to seek international protection in Poland and had legal representation from her organization. There was no reason, she said, why the Polish authorities could not take the group for standard processing that would then assess whether they should be granted asylum or returned to their home countries. The decision to keep them in limbo was political posturing, she said.
“It’s really cruel. And it has basically no purpose,” she said. “Because you know it’s 32 people—they are able to process them. It’s not like it is 3 million standing here. We are not asking just for a free pass. We just want the Polish authorities and border guards to behave according to the law. Because right now what they are doing is illegal.”
Poland’s government on Tuesday announced it was seeking approval from the country’s president for a state of emergency to be imposed along part of the border for 30 days in response to migrant arrivals.
“The situation on the border with Belarus is a crisis, it’s very tense because Lukashenko’s regime is transporting people mainly from Iraq to the territory of Belarus and is then shoving these people on to the territory of Poland, Lithuania and Latvia to destabilize our countries,” Poland’s prime minister, Mateusz Morawiecki, said.
The move, which would cover 183 towns 3 kilometers from the border, also requires approval from parliament. It has already attracted criticism from opposition parties and rights groups, which have said the state of emergency is less about stopping migrants than making it harder for activists and the media to be present at the border.
Jan Grabiec, a spokesperson for Civic Platform, the largest opposition party, said the state of emergency was not aimed at halting migrants and “it will only stop the Polish media from showing the chaos and helplessness of the government.”
Lithuania has also declared a state of emergency over the border situation and has appealed to the E.U. to impose new sanctions on Belarus. Both Poland and Lithuania strongly backed the Belarusian opposition during the protests against Lukashenko last year, offering asylum to some of its key leaders.
The European Court of Human Rights last week said Poland’s government must provide food, clothing, medical care and possibly temporary shelter to the Afghans. The court has not yet ruled whether Poland is obliged to let the migrants enter its territory.
(LONDON) — More than one year after stepping down from their royal roles and moving to America, Prince Harry and Meghan, the Duke and Duchess of Sussex, are “thriving,” according to Omid Scobie, co-author of Finding Freedom, a book about the Sussexes’ life together.
The couple, however, has not managed to heal the well-publicized rift between Harry and his family, particularly his father, Prince Charles, and brother, Prince William, according to Scobie.
“When we speak to sources close to the couple and also sources close to the royal family, there is this feeling that very little progress is being made,” Scobie told Good Morning America. “However, some feelings have subsided because time has done its things, so the door is very much open for those conversations to happen at some point.”
The last time Harry and William were seen together publicly was in July, when Harry traveled to the U.K. for the unveiling of a statue of their late mom, Princess Diana, on what would have been her 60th birthday.
The reportedly estranged brothers lost their mom 24 years ago Tuesday after a car crash in the Pont D’Alma Bridge in Paris. William and Harry were 15 and 12, respectively, at the time.
Describing what will need to happen for the family relationships to be repaired, Scobie added, “I think one thing was clear from both sides is that everyone feels that some accountability and ownership in each other’s roles in all of this has to be taken for people to move forward. Whether that happens, we shall see.”
Scobie, an ABC News contributor, and his co-author, Carolyn Durand, a former ABC News producer, have released a new paperback version of their book, Finding Freedom, which takes a close look at how life has changed for Harry and Meghan since they left royal life and moved to California.
“Who can forget Meghan saying, ‘It’s not enough to survive, you have to thrive,’ and I think this is that time where they’re thriving and they want to show the world how they’re doing it,” said Scobie, who describes Harry and Meghan as “very much in control” of their lives today.
“It’s not that they want to disappear or not be seen,” Scobie added, reflecting on Harry and Meghan’s desire for privacy. “It’s simply that they want to choose what they keep private and what they share with the world.”
Prince Harry and Meghan famously spilled the details of their exit from royal life last spring in a blockbuster interview with Oprah Winfrey.
The Sussexes — who spoke candidly in the interview about mental health struggles, family tensions and alleged racism they faced — were “desperate to get their story out there,” according to Scobie.
“It was the one thing they weren’t allowed to do, you know, that never complain, never explain mentality, or the mantra of the royal family, applied to them as well,” said Scobie. “So any time that they wanted to speak up, whether it’s to correct the story in the tabloids or to simply put their feelings and thoughts out there, the answer was always no.”
Once Harry and Meghan were on their own, “it was very much the time being now for them to actually speak up and try and speak to some of those moments that many of us perhaps didn’t understand over the last couple of years,” explained Scobie.
“There was this feeling that the couple had walked away from the monarchy because they just wanted more. They wanted to earn money in a different way,” he said. “But actually what we heard was a story that helped us understand why they were so unhappy within that space as well, not only dealing with racism, but having their mental health suppressed or ignored by certain quarters of the institution.”
“Those are things that are untenable for anyone, but we just didn’t know at the time it was happening [that’s what] was going on behind palace walls,” Scobie added.
In Finding Freedom, the authors say it was the courtiers who were fiercely protective of the royal institution and who mishandled Meghan and Harry, who is sixth in line to the throne.
“Those that work for the institution of the monarchy have one job, and that is to sort of uphold the values of the crown and maintain the image of the crown,” said Scobie. “The focus is always going to be on the crown, and Harry and Meghan found themselves victim to that many times over because, ultimately, they are not the crown.”
Harry and Meghan, already parents to a son, Archie, welcomed their second child, a daughter named Lilibet “Lili” Diana Mountbatten-Windsor, in June.
The family of four lives near Santa Barbara, California, where Harry and Meghan have continued to grow their production company and charitable organization, Archewell.
“One thing that was said to me very early on when the couple met was this is a couple that want to change the world in whatever way they can, they just need to figure out how,” said Scobie. “And I think what we’re seeing right now is them having figured it out.”
“The Sussexes are clearly in a new chapter. I feel like we’ve told as much as this story as we can, and they’re clearly in control of their narrative,” he added. “Now I think that when and if we hear more of their journey towards healing these family relations and the issues that they’ve faced, it’s going to be from them themselves.”
