KABUL – Chaos in Afghanistan. Despite the assurances of the Taliban, who have captured Kabul and taken control of the presidential palace by announcing the rebirth of the Islamic Emirate and guaranteeing that “citizens’ lives will not be at risk”, people are fleeing the country.
Today the capital’s airport was literally stormed. On social networks, in particular on Twitter, numerous videos have appeared showing people running on the airport runways and trying to board flights, clinging to trolleys, engines. Someone crashes as the plane gains altitude.
Chilling scenes, such as those posted by Muslim Shirzad, teacher and former TV presenter of Tolonews, an Afghan broadcaster. Seven dead were counted yesterday.
Afghanistan’s Tragedy: Kabul Airport pic.twitter.com/P9E74ADURv
— Muslim Shirzad (@MuslimShirzad) August 16, 2021
Kabul is therefore in the hands of the Taliban in a few hours: after entering the city, with the mass entry of power, the fundamentalists suddenly swerved towards the full seizure of power fighters who were waiting for the green light at the gates of the city.
President Ashraf Ghani fled and arrived with his family and some loyalists in Tajikistan or, perhaps, in Oman. The hypothesis circulated of a transitional government headed by former Interior Minister Ali Ahmad Jalali has therefore evaporated within a few hours, with the occupation of the presidential palace. “The Taliban have made it to arms, they are here to attack all the inhabitants of Kabul. To say a bloodbath, I thought it was better to leave and go” then the now former president said in a message on social media to explain his decision.
On the other hand, a spokesman for the Taliban political office told Al Jazeera that the war in Afghanistan “is over”, adding that it will be clear “soon” what kind of government there will be and that the group is ready to dialogue with “Afghan personality”, who will be guaranteed the necessary protection. The spokesman reiterated that security will be guaranteed to citizens and diplomatic missions.
But the diplomatic world is leaving Afghanistan to its fate: the same foreign diplomats, in fact, were among the first to storm the capital’s airport in the hope of catching the first useful flight to leave the country.
Italy has in turn evacuated the Embassy and the plan for the evacuation of diplomats and citizens has begun, which also includes an airlift for the evacuation of all Afghan collaborators of the Defense and Foreign Ministries. The first of the Air Force has already landed at the Fiumicino airport in Rome with about 70 people returning from Afghanistan on board: fifty members of the Italian diplomatic staff and about twenty former Afghan collaborators.
Foreign Minister Luigi Di Maio assured that other flights will take off from Kabul in the coming days and that a diplomatic garrison will remain at the airport: “The situation is tragic, we will not abandon the Afghans”, he stressed.
And a meeting of EU foreign ministers is scheduled for tomorrow.
The assault on Kabul airport from Muslim Shirzad’s Twitter profile who also published the video
