Afghan passengers are pictured in-front of a Qatar Airways airplane at Kabul Worldwide Airport, in Kabul, Afghanistan September 19, 2021.
Qatar’s Ministry of Overseas Affa | by way of Reuters
WASHINGTON — A business flight carrying 21 Individuals and 48 lawful everlasting U.S. residents departed Kabul, Afghanistan, over the weekend, the State Division confirmed Monday.
In whole, at the very least 85 Americans and 79 lawful everlasting residents have left Afghanistan since the U.S. ended a massive humanitarian evacuation and completed the withdrawal of its troops in August, based on State Division figures.
“We’re grateful to Qatari authorities, who proceed to coordinate these flights with the Taliban,” State Division spokesman Ned Worth mentioned Monday. The Biden administration continues to be working to assist Americans, lawful everlasting residents and weak Afghans go away, Worth added.
The Taliban’s fast takeover of Afghanistan final month prompted a chaotic effort by the U.S. and its allies to get their residents and weak Afghans overseas. By Aug. 31, roughly 125,000 folks, together with about 6,000 U.S. residents and their households, have been evacuated overseas.
Nonetheless, not everybody was capable of make it out in time. Secretary of State Antony Blinken instructed lawmakers final week that roughly 100 U.S. residents are nonetheless searching for evacuation from Afghanistan.
Blinken blamed the Trump administration for America’s chaotic exit from its longest warfare, saying: “We inherited a deadline; we didn’t inherit a plan.”
“There had not been a single interview within the Particular Immigrant Visa program in Kabul for 9 months, going again to March of 2020. This system was principally in a stall,” Blinken mentioned on Sept. 13.
“We made the precise choice in ending America’s longest warfare, we made the precise choice in not sending a 3rd technology of Individuals to battle and die in Afghanistan,” Blinken mentioned.
President Joe Biden has defended his choice to withdraw U.S. troops from Afghanistan, regardless of the Taliban takeover. Biden was compelled to order the non permanent deployment of thousands of U.S. troops to Kabul with a view to assist with evacuation efforts final month.
13 U.S. service members and dozens of Afghans died in an ISIS-Okay suicide bombing at Kabul’s airport throughout the evacuation. A subsequent U.S. drone strike in Kabul killed as many as 10 civilians in what the Pentagon has described as a tragic mistake.
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