Evacuation flights resume a day after chaotic scenes shut down Kabul airport

Military flights evacuating diplomats and civilians from Afghanistan re-started early on Tuesday after the runway at Kabul airport was cleared of thousands of people desperate to flee after the Taliban seized the capital.

The number of civilians at the airport had thinned out, according to a Western security official at the facility, a day after chaotic scenes at the Hamid Karzai International Airport left at least five people dead as US police fired gunshots to disperse crowds of people desperate to flee the Taliban takeover.

The body of an Afghan was found in the landing gear of a US C-17 transport aircraft hours after it hastily took off on Monday with desperate people clinging to the aircraft, according to US media reports. 

A U.S. official told journalists that two gunmen who had appeared to have fired into the crowd were killed by US troops.

Order was restored at the airport and evacuation flights resumed by Tuesday, according to security officials.

"Many people who were here yesterday have gone home," said a security official. However, witnesses said they could still hear occasional shots coming from the direction of the airport, while streets elsewhere in Kabul appeared calm.

 

U.S. forces took charge of the airport, the only remaining exit point from Afghanistan, as the Taliban held control of all ground routes after the insurgents streamed triumphantly into Kabul on Sunday, capturing the capital without a fight.

Biden breaks his silence

Against the scenes of panic and confusion in Kabul, U.S. President Joe Biden on Monday defended his decision to withdraw U.S. forces, breaking his silence on the pullout after scenes of bedlam dominated television news channels for days. 

Biden blamed the Taliban's takeover in Afghanistan on Afghan political leaders who fled the country and the unwillingness of the U.S.-trained Afghan army to fight the militant group.

But the video on Monday of hundreds of desperate Afghans trying to clamber onto a U.S. military plane as it was about to take-off could haunt the United States, just as a photograph in 1975 of people scrambling to get on a helicopter on the roof of the US embassy in Saigon became emblematic of the humiliating withdrawal from Vietnam.

Europe urges unity on Taliban, migration

European leaders on Monday said they will press for a unified international approach to dealing with a Taliban government in Afghanistan, as they looked on with dismay at the rapid collapse of two decades of a U.S.-led Western campaign in the country.

British Prime Minister Boris Johnson spoke to Macron, stressing the need for a common stand, both on recognising any future Afghan government and to prevent a humanitarian and refugee crisis.

Both leaders agreed to co-operate at the UN Security Council, and Johnson also said he will host a virtual meeting of G7 leaders on Afghanistan in the next few days. 

German Chancellor Angela Merkel’s spokesman echoed that sentiment Monday, saying the question of whether there can be a dialogue with the Taliban needs to be discussed internationally. 

“We do not have any illusions about the Taliban and the essence of their movement,” said Steffen Seibert, the spokesman.

Macron also raised fears of uncontrolled migration to Europe by Afghans, saying that France, Germany and other European countries would work to swiftly develop a “robust, coordinated and united response.”   (France24/AFP/AP/REUTERS)