Afghanistan: Taliban ‘will not allow Afghans to go to Kabul airport’

KABUL: AUGUST 25 -Taliban spokesman Zabihullah Mujahid said Afghan citizens would no longer be allowed to enter Kabul airport.

Speaking at a news conference on Tuesday, he said “those people must return home and their safety will be ensured.” But he accused the United States of calling people to the airport and boarding planes.

A Taliban spokesman, a Mujahid, told a news conference a few hours later that US partners had said that all Afghan civilians who had fled in fear of the Taliban’s return before the August 31 deadline for the withdrawal of US troops from Afghanistan could not be rescued.

What more could a Taliban spokesman say?

More than 58,000 people have fled the US-controlled Kabul airport so far.

Most of them are Afghan nationals who have served with foreign forces.

But Taliban spokesman Mujahid said: “We urge the Americans not to force the Afghans to leave the country … we need their skills.” A Taliban spokesman said he did not expect the deadline to be extended this month, saying “there is time to take all foreign nationals out of the country.”

A Taliban spokesman urged foreign embassies not to close or evacuate, saying security had been assured.

Zabihullah Mujahid said that women would not be permanently barred from going to work, adding that “for the time being there is no ill-treatment … it is in their interest.”

He said the Afghan media, hospitals, educational institutions and local governments had resumed work. Stating that no one was targeted for revenge and that there was no list, he said “everything in the past has been forgotten.”

‘Terrible abuse’

But Michelle Bachelet, head of the Office of the High Commissioner for Human Rights (OHCHR), told an emergency meeting of the UN Human Rights Council that she had received “horrific and credible” reports of abuse in Taliban-controlled areas.

Speaking at an emergency meeting of the UN Human Rights Council in Geneva, Bachelet called on member states to set up a committed body to monitor Afghanistan.

“The basic red line is how the Taliban treat women and adolescents,” she said. She said there was pressure on killings, child recruitment, discrimination against women and peaceful protests in Afghanistan.

-BBC