Live updates Reports of several dead chaos at Kabul airport amid scramble to flee Taliban

Several people were reportedly killed Monday at Kabul airport, where thousands of panicked Afghans and foreign nationals have gathered in hope of leaving Taliban-controlled Afghanistan. At least five people were killed amid the chaos of people fearful for their lives trying to force their way onto planes, Reuters reported, citing multiple witnesses.

It wasn’t clear how the people were killed. U.S. forces previously fired in the air to warn unauthorized people from trying to board military flights, according to numerous reports early Monday.

The State Department said Sunday that U.S. forces have secured control of the airport’s perimeter. The American military presence will swell to nearly 6,000 by early this week, with soldiers having the sole mission of helping U.S. and allied personnel depart the country.

Here are the significant developments

By Sunday evening, the Taliban had taken control of the presidential palace in Kabul, underscoring their lightning quick seizure of cities in the past week.

As of late Sunday, all U.S. Embassy personnel had been moved to the airport, the State Department said. The British ambassador was also on-site helping to process the visas of Afghans who had worked for the United Kingdom.

U.S. officials said they will accelerate the evacuation of thousands of Afghans eligible for Special Immigrant Visas. About 2,000 have arrived in the United States over the past two weeks, a fraction of the estimated 88,000 that could need to be evacuated.

More than 60 nations released a joint statement calling on all parties in Afghanistan “to respect and facilitate, the safe and orderly departure of foreign nationals and Afghans who wish to leave the country.”

Biden administration scrambled as its orderly withdrawal from Afghanistan unraveledLink copied

By the middle of the week, as cities across Afghanistan were falling like dominoes to the Taliban and U.S. diplomats appeared increasingly at risk, President Biden’s plan for an orderly end to the United States’ longest war was quickly falling apart.

On Wednesday evening, Biden convened his top advisers to assess the ominous turn of events. One by one, in the cramped Situation Room in the White House basement, national security adviser Jake Sullivan, Defense Secretary Lloyd Austin and Secretary of State Antony Blinken outlined the administration’s options for ensuring the security of U.S. personnel. Biden asked them to return with recommendations.

When the aides reconvened early the next morning, things had gotten worse. The Taliban was taking control of more and more of Afghanistan’s 34 provincial capitals, most of them seized without a major fight, and the militants were bearing down on Kabul, the national capital. After being briefed by Sullivan and Austin, Biden gave the order to activate a plan deploying troops to secure the Kabul airport and create an evacuation route for Americans on the ground.

Fears of violence grow in Taliban-held KabulLink copied

Hundreds of thousands of Afghans have fled their homes as reports of retributory violence by Taliban insurgents against people who had worked for the now-fallen government fuel concerns about life under Islamist militant rule.

In Kabul, claims of abuses and bloodshed, including executions, were emerging just hours after the capital city fell. The last time the Taliban ruled Afghanistan, they led a profoundly violent and repressive nation that became a global pariah.

“I’m sad to report that friends in Kabul are reporting violence tonight. Some claim revenge executions, others criminality,” Tom Tugendhat, a senior British lawmaker who served in Afghanistan, tweeted late Sunday. “A city half the size of London handed over to a violent cult. We are not likely near the end of the horror.”

Some Afghans who had fled for Kabul last week reportedly saw the insurgents kill captured soldiers in Taliban-controlled areas. The U.S. Embassy in Kabul said Aug. 12 that it had come across reports of the Taliban executing surrendering Afghan troops. Those claims could not immediately be independently verified.

Twenty years after being dislodged from national power by the invasion of a U.S.-led coalition, the Taliban has sought to portray itself as a more moderate organization. The militant group has offered amnesty to Afghans who have worked for Western authorities and the now-collapsed government.

“It’s going to be all about the actions, not the words,” said New Zealand Prime Minister Jacinda Ardern on Monday. “The whole world is watching.”

Analysts say the Taliban’s treatment of civilians varies across provinces and districts as autonomous local commanders tailor their approach to ethnic ties and local politics, The Washington Post has reported.

The United Nations Security Council is set to hold an emergency meeting Monday to discuss the deepening humanitarian crisis.

U.N. Secretary General António Guterres, who has repeatedly condemned attacks on Afghan civilians and called for a peaceful settlement between the Taliban and government representatives, said Monday that “all abuses must stop.”

“International humanitarian law and human rights, especially the hard-won gains of women and girls, must be preserved,” he wrote on Twitter.

The fall of Saigon: As Taliban seizes Kabul, the Vietnam War’s final days remembered Link copied

President Gerald Ford was in a meeting with his energy team when his deputy national security adviser came in and passed him a note. It warned that Saigon was falling, and faster than expected.

Congress and the Pentagon had been pressuring him for weeks to move faster on evacuating Americans and their South Vietnamese allies, and now time was running out.

That’s what Ford faced on the evening of April 28, 1975, and it is history repeating itself now. After 20 years of U.S. involvement, the Taliban entered the Afghan capital, Kabul, on Sunday morning, as the United States scrambled to evacuate embassy staff and accelerate the rescue and relocation of Afghans who aided the U.S. military.

Emirates suspends flights to Kabul in blow to fleeing Afghan civiliansLink copied

Emirates, a flag carrier airline of the United Arab Emirates, said early Monday that it has suspended flights to Kabul airport until further notice. The move came as chaotic scenes of Afghans attempting Sunday to flee Taliban control via the airport circulated on social media.

Kabul airport â€" the only route out of Afghanistan not controlled by the Taliban, according to the Associated Press â€" was shut to civilian traffic for a time and an Emirates flight that had been scheduled to land at the airport Sunday was forced to return to Dubai. The airline attributed the abandoned landing to an “unforeseen temporary closure of the runway.”

U.S. Defense Secretary Lloyd Austin said the airport was later reopened to commercial planes.

Emirates maintains one of the largest flight networks in the region, and the suspension is yet another blow to locals who had been hoping to flee to the UAE, which has a large Afghan diaspora. Etihad, the other major airline in the UAE, does not service Kabul.

The United States has relocated its embassy personnel to the airport, and the State Department said late Sunday that U.S. forces have established control over its perimeter. American personnel are also taking charge of air traffic control at the airport. Some foreign troops, including Turks, remain on-site.

“Tomorrow and over the coming days, we will be transferring out of the country thousands of American citizens who have been resident in Afghanistan, as well as locally employed staff of the U.S. mission in Kabul and their families and other particularly vulnerable Afghan nationals,” the State Department and the Defense Department said in a joint statement.

Afghanistan’s collapse leaves allies questioning U.S. resolve on other fronts Link copied

LONDON â€" The Taliban's stunningly swift advances across Afghanistan have sparked global alarm, reviving doubts about the credibility of U.S. foreign policy promises and drawing harsh criticisms even from some of the United States' closest allies.

As Taliban fighters entered Kabul and the United States scrambled to evacuate its citizens, concerns grew that the unfolding chaos could create a haven for terrorists, unleash a major humanitarian disaster and trigger a new refugee exodus.

U.S. allies complain that they were not fully consulted on a policy decision that potentially puts their own national security interests at risk â€" in contravention of President Biden's promises to recommit to global engagement.

And many around the world are wondering whether they could rely on the United States to fulfill long-standing security commitments stretching from Europe to East Asia.

U.S. takes steps to secure airport, traffic control amid exodusLink copied

U.S. officials said Sunday they were taking steps to secure Kabul’s airport to enable civilian and military flights to depart safely, as photos and videos showed chaotic scenes of thousands of foreign nationals and Afghans trying to board flights.

In a joint statement Sunday, the State Department and the Pentagon said that the United States will expand its security presence to nearly 6,000 troops within the next 48 hours. U.S. forces will also take over responsibility for air traffic control.

Over the coming days, the United States plans to evacuate thousands of American citizens from Afghanistan, as well as local staff employed by the U.S. mission in Kabul, their families and other particularly vulnerable Afghan nationals, officials said.

The U.S. government will also accelerate the evacuation of thousands of Afghans eligible for Special Immigrant Visas, nearly 2,000 of whom have already arrived in the United States over the past two weeks.

As the Taliban encircled and then entered Kabul on Sunday, U.S. personnel at the embassy in Afghanistan relocated to the airport along with acting ambassador Ross Wilson, who left the sprawling diplomatic compound with the American flag. As of late Sunday, “all embassy personnel” had been moved to the airport, said State Department spokesman Ned Price.

More than 60 nations released a joint statement Sunday calling on all parties in Afghanistan “to respect and facilitate, the safe and orderly departure of foreign nationals and Afghans who wish to leave the country.”

The British ambassador reportedly stayed behind at Kabul airport to help process visas for Afghan staff that had worked for London.

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