Taliban ban Afghans from Kabul airport amid British and U.S. airlifts

Biden to stand firm on U.S. withdrawal deadline of August 31

Tuesday, August 24, 2021

By Steven Swinford, the political editor, David Charter in Washington, and Catherine Philp, diplomatic correspondent

Reprinted from The Times London

President Biden is set to stick to a deadline of August 31 to withdraw from Afghanistan despite the Taliban barring Afghans from travelling to board evacuation flights.

Zabihullah Mujahid, the Taliban spokesman, told a press conference that only foreigners would be allowed to reach the airport in Kabul for flights laid on by Nato and western forces.

“The road to Kabul airport is closed for locals and open to foreigners,” Mujahid said. “We fully assure the locals and tell them to return to their homes.” He added: “We are not in favour of allowing Afghans to leave”.

The Taliban have also told women to stay at home for their own safety, saying: “It’s currently for their benefit to prevent any ill treatment.”

Boris Johnson said at a meeting of G7 nations this afternoon that the U.K. was confident it could get thousands more people out of Afghanistan before August 31. “We will go right up to the last moment we can,” he said.

He said that the seven countries had agreed that the “number one condition” on the Taliban would be that they continued to safeguard the passage of people out of the country.

As part of a “road map” for future discussions with the Taliban the leaders agreed on a series of other conditions, including the education of girls up to the age of 18 and that Afghanistan would avoid a return to terrorism. Johnson said that developed nations had “huge levers” and “very considerable influence”, including on whether funds were unfrozen.

The Pentagon advice to pull out U.S. forces at the end of the month was made on Monday based on concerns about security risks to American forces, an official said. Biden has asked for contingency plans to stay longer, should it be necessary.

The recommendation reflects increasing security concerns at the airport, where evacuations are based on the Taliban’s consent.

It came as a U.S. military chief announced that American forces had evacuated 63,900 U.S. citizens, Nato personnel and Afghan civilians since July. Earlier today, the White House said that 21,600 people were flown out over a 24-hour period on Monday. Evacuation planes departed from Kabul airport every 45 minutes.

John Kirby, the Pentagon’s press secretary, said he expected to get 100,000 people out of the Taliban-controlled capital by the end of the week.

Ben Wallace, the defence secretary, warned that continuing the evacuation without America would mean Britain becoming an occupying power.

He said that the armed forces risked a “permanent fight” if they stayed in Kabul beyond August 31 as he said the Taliban would launch mortar attacks that could close the airport if western countries tried to extend the airlift.

He said that “every hour matters”, with 2,000 people evacuated in the past day, but Britain is increasingly resigned to having to conclude its airlift from Kabul by the end of the week.

Johnson used the G7 meeting to push Biden to put back the August 31 deadline for the U.S. withdrawal.

France, Germany and other nations supported an extension, but the Taliban has warned that any delay in the withdrawal would cross a “red line”. The group said that there would be “consequences” if western forces stayed in Afghanistan for longer, warning that any further extension would “create mistrust”.

Earlier today, Wallace told Sky News that an extension was “unlikely” because of the Taliban’s warnings and Biden’s statements, but insisted: “It is definitely worth us all trying, and we will.”

He said on ITV’s Good Morning Britain that the chances of any delay were “slim” but added: “Originally, about a week and a half ago, the timescale to draw out our military was about 120 hours. We’ve managed to cut that significantly, and every hour we save in taking out our own military is an hour we can process more Afghan claimants and people under the scheme. Every hour matters.”

However, Wallace said there was “certainly no space” for Britain and other European allies to stay without American troops. “The U.S. are running the airport, they’re running everything from air traffic control to the firefighters on the ground,” he told Times Radio.

If British forces stayed in Kabul the Taliban and Isis would “seek to start attacking and aircraft, airfields that have mortar bombs coming in just can’t fly. And so the whole thing would grind to a halt.”

Challenged on what was the point of British armed forces if they could not hold an airport, he told Today on Radio 4 that he “could fly in thousands of troops and secure the airport . . . for a few months, or maybe a year or two. But for what purpose? For them to be shot at, attacked, people not to get to the airport and to trigger just a permanent fight? I don’t think that is a solution.”

He said that in Afghanistan, “if you go in as a single superpower, whether that’s the British Empire in the 19th century, whether it’s the Soviet Union, you will find a history will repeat itself and so you will switch from being an international security force to effectively an occupying power in the eyes and many of the Afghan tribes, and you will end up in a permanent fight”.

Wallace also said he would not “prioritise pets over people” as he rebuked a former Royal Marine for complaining that the U.K. would not allow a charter flight to take staff and rescue dogs out of Kabul. Paul Farthing complained that he was unable to use a privately funded plane to evacuate 200 dogs and cats along with his staff, but Wallace said that Farthing should take up the place on a military flight he had been offered.

He told Sky News: “If he wants to repatriate the pets that he looks after and the strays, I genuinely believe that they will be allowed to move forward at a later date when that airport opens. But frankly I have to prioritise people at the moment over pets.”

Sir Laurie Bristow, Britain’s ambassador to Afghanistan, told MPs yesterday that remaining longer would “provoke a reaction” and described the Taliban’s commitment to August 31 as “uncompromising”.

James Heappey, the armed forces minister, said that extending beyond a week today risked turning Kabul into a “war zone”, with soldiers attempting to manage the evacuation while fending off potential Taliban attacks.

The Pentagon also played down the prospect of an extension, saying: “Our focus is on getting this done by the end of the month.”

Three senior British government sources told The Times that they expected Biden to stick to his deadline. Ministers have been buoyed, however, by the recent success of the evacuation.

Wallace said that 8,600 people had been airlifted out since August 14, including more than 2,000 people yesterday, an increase on the 1,821 on Sunday. One government source expected the “vast majority” of the 4,000 British passport holders, Afghan interpreters and other support staff in Afghanistan to have left by the end of the week.

The Ministry of Defence also wants to evacuate a further 2,000 people, including Afghan politicians, human rights campaigners and female judges, although the last RAF evacuation flight for Afghan citizens is due to leave by the end of this week so the military can itself withdraw before the deadline.

Biden announced last month that the 20-year U.S. mission in Afghanistan would be over by August 31. It followed a deal between the U.S. and the Taliban in which the group agreed to stop attacking foreign forces before the withdrawal.