An Afghan family enter into Pakistan through a border crossing point, in Chaman, Pakistan, Friday, Aug. 20, 2021. (AP)Afghanistan-Taliban crisis Live Updates: A Taliban official on Saturday denied abduction of any foreigner by the Islamist militant group, however, stating that some were being questioned before leaving Afghanistan. As several countries struggled to ramp up evacuations in Afghanistan amid chaos just a week after Taliban took over the south Asian nation, there were reports of the Taliban kidnapping foreigners. “Our fighters will continue to demonstrate restraint,” news agency Reuters quoted the Taliban official as saying. Ruling out incidents of reported kidnappings, he added, “We are questioning some of them before they exit the country.”
A group of 72 Afghan Sikhs and Hindus were stopped by the Taliban from boarding an Indian Air Force (IAF) plane to India. An IAF C-130J transport aircraft took off from Kabul with around 85 Indians, PTI reported. It landed in Dushanbe in Tajikistan for refuelling, before making its way to New Delhi.
Meanwhile, the Taliban are likely to unveil a new governing framework for Afghanistan within the next few weeks, a spokesperson said on Saturday. “Legal, religious and foreign policy experts in the Taliban aim to present the new governing framework in the next few weeks,” the official told Reuters. Since returning to power in the country, the Taliban has sought to present a more moderate face. The co-founder of the militant group, Mullah Abdul Ghani Baradar, arrived in Kabul on Saturday for talks with fellow members of the group and other politicians on establishing a new Afghan government.
The Taliban will be accountable for its actions and will investigate reports of reprisals and atrocities carried out by members, an official of the Islamist militant group told Reuters on Saturday.
The ongoing evacuation of US citizens and Afghan nationals who supported Americans over the last two decades is one of the largest and most difficult airlifts in history, US President Joe Biden said Friday. He had earlier pledged to bring back all Americans from the country, which descended into a state of chaos after the Taliban’s return to power.
The US government will retain a laser focus on its counterterrorism mission in Afghanistan, President Biden said, warning of a forceful response to any attack on American forces or disruption of its operations at the Kabul airport. “We’re also keeping a close watch on any potential terrorist threat at or around the airport, including from the ISIS affiliates in Afghanistan,” he said.
Afghan President Ashraf Ghani has found refuge in the United Arab Emirates. (File photo from Facebook/Ashraf Ghani/via REUTERS)
British Prime Minister Boris Johnson has said the UK's diplomatic efforts to find a solution in Afghanistan remain ongoing, which leaves open the prospect of working with the Taliban "if necessary". Speaking to the media after an emergency Cabinet Office Briefing Rooms (COBRA) meeting to discuss the crisis in the region on Friday, Johnson said "formidable" challenges remain around the evacuation of British nationals and supporters from Kabul airport but the situation was getting "slightly better". "What I want to assure people is that our political and diplomatic efforts to find a solution for Afghanistan, working with the Taliban, of course if necessary, will go on and our commitment to Afghanistan is lasting," Johnson said. --PTI
Days after vowing to respect women’s rights in Afghanistan, Taliban officials in the restive Herat province have banned co-education in government and private universities, describing it as the ‘root of all evils in society’.
The decision was taken after a meeting between varsity professors, owners of private institutions, and Taliban authorities, Khaama Press News Agency reported on Saturday.
This is the first ‘fatwa’ issued by the Taliban after its swift takeover of Afghanistan last week. Capital Kabul’s capture on Sunday signified the end of the US’s longest war, launched after the September 11, 2001 terror attacks. Read more
National Reconciliation Council chairperson Abdullah Abdullah and former president Hamid Karzai met Abdul Rahman Mansoor, the acting Taliban governor for Kabul, and discussed the priority of protecting people's lives and property.
A Taliban official on Saturday denied abduction of any foreigner by the Islamist militant group, however, stating that some are being questioned before leaving Afghanistan. As several countries struggled to ramp up evacuations in Afghanistan amid chaos just a week after Taliban took over the south Asian nation, there were reports of the Taliban kidnapping foreigners. "Our fighters will continue to demonstrate restraint," news agency Reuters quoted the Taliban official as saying. Ruling out incidents of reported kidnappings, he added, "We are questioning some of them before they exit the country."
Fourteen people were arrested from across Assam for alleged social media posts supporting the Taliban takeover of Afghanistan, police said on Saturday.
The arrests were made since Friday night and they have been booked under different sections of the Unlawful Activities (Prevention) Act, IT Act and CrPC, a senior police officer said. "We were on alert and monitoring social media for inflammatory posts," the officer said. Two people each were arrested from Kamrup Metropolitan, Barpeta, Dhubri and Karimganj districts, police said. (PTI)
A group of 72 Afghan Sikhs and Hindus were Saturday stopped by the Taliban from boarding an Indian Air Force (IAF) plane to India. An IAF C-130J transport aircraft took off from Kabul with around 85 Indians. It landed in Dushanbe in Tajikistan for refuelling, before making its way to New Delhi.
Taiwan's foreign minister accused China on Saturday of wanting to "emulate" the Taliban, saying the island that Beijing claims as sovereign Chinese territory did not wish to be subject to communism or crimes against humanity.
The rapid fall of the U.S.-backed Afghan government has sparked heated debate in Taiwan about whether they could suffer the same fate to a Chinese invasion, while state media in China has said Kabul's fate showed Taiwan it cannot trust Washington.Writing on Twitter in response to the U.S. State Department reiterating a call for China to stop pressuring the island, Taiwan Foreign Minister Joseph Wu expressed his thanks to the United States for upholding the wishes and best interests of Taiwan's people.
"They include democracy & freedom from communism, authoritarianism & crimes against humanity," Wu said. (Reuters)
The island kingdom of Bahrain has said it is "allowing flights to make use of Bahrain's transit facilities" amid the evacuations of Afghanistan. The kingdom made the announcement in a statement released early Saturday. Bahrain, in the Persian Gulf off Saudi Arabia, is home to the U.S. Navy's 5th Fleet. The announcement comes as the U.S. faced issues Friday with its facilities at Al-Udeid Air Base in Qatar filling up with those fleeing the Taliban takeover of the country. (AP)
The Taliban's co-founder Mullah Abdul Ghani Baradar arrived in Kabul on Saturday for talks with fellow members of the group and other politicians on establishing a new Afghan government, AFP reported.
"He will be in Kabul to meet jihadi leaders and politicians for an inclusive government set-up," a senior Taliban official told AFP.
An Indian Air Force C-130J transport aircraft took off from Kabul with over 85 Indians, ANI reported. The aircraft landed in Tajikistan for refuelling, sources said.
President Joe Biden made up his mind about Afghanistan months, really years, ago. For more than a decade, Biden advocated for an end to American involvement in Afghanistan. But he did so as something of an outsider, a senator whose ultimate power came in the form of a single vote on Capitol Hill or a vice president who advised another president.
But authority over America's longest war finally fell into Biden's hands this year and he insisted that the US withdraw from Afghanistan, settling on an August 31 deadline. And despite the rapid collapse of the Afghan government, spurring a humanitarian crisis and searing criticism at home and from traditional allies, he was resolute, at times defiant. He took responsibility and in turns leveled blame at his predecessor. (AP)
The Pakistan Cricket Board has put on hold a training camp that was scheduled to start on Saturday in Lahore and also the announcement of its squad for the One-Day series against Afghanistan next month in Sri Lanka.
With Taliban taking over the reins of Afghanistan and the country facing its worst crisis in last two decades, the PCB wants a confirmation from Afghanistan Cricket Board whether the series is on and only the will they announce the squad.
The series is due to begin on September 3 in Hambantota in Sri Lanka with the Sri Lanka board hosting the matches on behalf of the ACB. (PTI)
Secretary of State Antony Blinken says 13 countries have thus far agreed to at least temporarily host at-risk Afghans evacuated from Afghanistan and a dozen more have agreed to serve as transit points for evacuees, including Americans and others. Blinken says in a Friday statement that potential Afghan refugees not already cleared for resettlement in the United States will be housed at facilities in Albania, Canada, Colombia, Costa Rica, Chile, Kosovo, North Macedonia, Mexico, Poland, Qatar, Rwanda, Ukraine and Uganda. (AP)
On the outskirts of Pakistan's populous metropolitan city of Karachi is nestled a slum township, which in recent days is seeing an influx of Afghan families fleeing from the Taliban rule in the northern Kunduz province in conflict-ridden Afghanistan.
Located on the northern outskirts, just off the super highway outside Karachi, the Afghan basti (slum township), which is made up of concrete and mud houses and even has families residing in tarpaulin tents, is seeing more displaced Afghan families reaching here since the Taliban seized control of Afghanistan and also took over Kabul. (PTI)
The Taliban will be accountable for its actions and will investigate reports of reprisals and atrocities carried out by members, an official of the Islamist militant group told Reuters on Saturday.
The official, who spoke on condition of anonymity, added that the group planned to ready a new model for governing Afghanistan within the next few weeks.
It has been just a week since the Taliban completed a lighting fast takeover of the country, finally walking into Kabul last Sunday without firing a shot.Since then, individual Afghans and international aid and advocacy groups have reported harsh retaliation against protests, and roundups of those who formerly held government positions, criticised the Taliban or worked with Americans. (Reuters)
India should keep diplomatic channels open for talks with the Taliban, but move very cautiously towards legitimising it, former diplomat Gautam Mukhopadhyay said on Friday.
Speaking at a discussion organised by the Press Club of India, he said "a false narrative" is being built to project the Taliban as different from what the world saw in Afghanistan two decades ago. "We must talk to them. That is diplomacy.... We should be very careful in legitimising the Taliban," he said. (PTI)
A heart-rending video of a baby being handed to US marines over a barbed-wire fence at the Kabul airport surfaced on Friday, days after the Taliban siezed control of the country. In an explanation issued at a recent press briefing, the US Department of Defense said that the infant required medical attention and has been reunited with its family, the New York Times reported.
Pentagon spokesperson John Kirby on Friday said that the family asked US troops to give medical care to their child. Soon after the baby was treated at a Norwegian hospital, it was handed back to its family.
The Taliban aim to unveil a new governing framework for Afghanistan in the next few weeks, a spokesman for the Islamist movement said on Saturday, after the insurgents' swift takeover of the South Asian nation.
'Legal, religious and foreign policy experts in the Taliban aim to present the new governing framework in the next few
weeks,' the official told Reuters. (Reuters)
The Indian Women's Press Corps (IWPC) on Friday condemned the killing of an Afghan journalist's relative by Taliban fighters and called upon the international community to make every effort to stop such "barbarity".
It also hoped that the Taliban will keep its word and protect the freedom of press, not harass journalists, particularly women, and allow the media to do its work freely. Taliban fighters recently killed a family member of an Afghan journalist, who works for German broadcaster Deutsche Welle.
"The IWPC strongly condemns the targeted killing of journalists and their relatives in Afghanistan by the Taliban and calls upon the international community to make every effort to stop this barbarity," it said in a statement. (PTI)