Media reports say the Taliban said yesterday that the group will not allow Afghan nationals to leave the country and opposes any extension of evacuation flights, a development that comes one week before U.S. and coalition forces are slated to depart Afghanistan.
“We are not in favor of allowing Afghans to leave,” Taliban spokesman Zabihullah Mujahid told reporters during a news conference Tuesday, according to CNBC.
“They [the Americans] have the opportunity, they have all the resources, they can take all the people that belong to them but we are not going to allow Afghans to leave and we will not extend the deadline,” he said, adding that evacuations carried out by foreign forces after August 31 would be a “violation” of a Biden administration promise to end the U.S. military’s mission in the country.
“The way to the airport has been closed now. Afghans are not allowed to go there now, foreigners are allowed to go but we have stopped Afghan nationals to go because the crowd is more, there is danger that people will lose their lives, there might be a stampede,” Mujahid said, according to an interpreter during the broadcast.
GardaWorld said yesterday that US-facilitated military evacuation flights are ongoing at the Hamid Karzai International Airport (KBL). Commercial flights reportedly remain suspended, though some foreign governments are using commercial airlines to facilitate evacuations.
