India’s focus is on ensuring security and safe return of its nationals still in Afghanistan,says S Jaishankar

Thomas (Special correspondent)

The focus of Indian government is on ensuring the safety and secure return of Indian nationals still present in Afghanistan,External Affairs Minister S Jaishankar said.

In their first official news conference in Kabul,the Taliban has promised to respect the rights of women,seek good relations with other countries and not to extract retribution on former members of the Afghan military.

The Taliban seized power in Afghanistan after the US-backed Afghan government collapsed and President Ghani fled the country.

The United Nations said on Wednesday it started moving up to 100 international staff out of Afghanistan to work from Kazakhstan,but stressed it is committed to staying and delivering in support of the Afghan people in their hour of need.

This is a temporary measure intended to enable the UN to keep delivering assistance to the people of Afghanistan with a minimum disruption,while at the same time reducing reducing the risk to UN personnel,UN spokesman Stephane Durjarric said.

The United Nations has about 300 international staff and 3,000 national staff in Afghanistan.

India should have publicly engaged with the Taliban before they took over Afghanistan,former External Affairs Minister K Natwar Singh said on Wednesday and favoured establishing diplomatic ties if they function as a responsible government going forward in the war-torn country.

Singh,who was the foreign minister in UPA-I and also served as India’s Ambassador to Pakistan besides holding other senior diplomatic positions,said India should adopt a wait and watch approach for the time being but noted that the Taliban that have taken over seems to be a “better lot” than those that ruled there two decades earlier.

In an interview with news agency, 92-year-old Singh said India was quite close to President Ashraf Ghani who has run away but the situation has altered drastically now.

Three people were killed and more than a dozen injured after Taliban militants opened fire during protests against the group in the Afghan city of Jalalabad on Wednesday, two witnesses.

A Taliban source said one person had been killed in the city, some 150 km (90 miles) to the east of Kabul. The witnesses said the shooting followed an attempt by local residents to install Afghanistan’s national flag at a square in Jalalabad.

Video footage shot by Pajhwok Afghan News, a local news agency, showed protesters in the city who were carrying the Afghan flag fleeing with the sound of gunshots in the background.

We are deeply worried about Afghan women and girls,their rights to education,work and freedom of movement.

We call on those in positions of power and authority across Afghanistan guarantee their protection, said a joint statement issued by the US, the UK,European Union,Australia,Canada and other countries.

The UAE Ministry of Foreign Affairs and International Cooperation can confirm that the UAE has welcomed President Ashraf Ghani and his family into the country on humanitarian grounds,an official statement noted.

French Foreign Minister Jean-Yves Le Drian tweeted on Wednesday that he had asked the Taliban to show through their behaviour that they have changed as they say.It is up to them to prove it,he said.

The Congress on Wednesday asked Prime Minister Narendra Modi to tell the nation what he has done to protect the interests of India after the Taliban captured power in Afghanistan.

Congress chief spokesperson Randeep Surjewala said the Taliban is a terrorist organisation which is linked to the Haqqani network in Pakistan, which indulge in anti-India terrorist acts with the help and support of the Pakistan government.

Britain is working with the Taliban in Kabul on a tactical,practical level to evacuate citizens and eligible Afghans,Britain’s ambassador to Afghanistan said on Wednesday,adding the evacuation programme would last days,not weeks.

Western nations are scrambling to get diplomats, civilians and eligible Afghans out of Kabul as the Taliban makes first efforts to set up a government after their lightning sweep into the capital.

“It is interesting the Taliban have chosen to support this operation,ambassador Laurie Bristow told reporters in a television clip filmed from Kabul.

My assessment is that they see it as in their interests to help it to happen in an orderly and clear way. And, obviously, it’s in our interests to see it that way, so we’re working with them where we need to at a tactical practical level.”

Asked how long he expected the evacuation effort to last, he said,We’re working on the basis of days, not weeks”.

Mohsin Dawar, a Pakistani lawmaker and leader of Pashtun Tahaffuz Movement (PTM), said Afghans are willing to die for their flag and identity despite the Taliban onslaught.

He shared a clip showing locals in Khost protesting against Taliban, which has been putting its flag at public places in place of the Afghan national flag.

Afghanistan may be governed by a ruling council now that the Taliban has taken over, while the Islamist militant movement’s supreme leader, Haibatullah Akhundzada, would likely remain in overall charge, a senior member of the group told news agency.

The Taliban would also reach out to former pilots and soldiers from the Afghan armed forces to join its ranks, Waheedullah Hashimi, who has access to the group’s decision-making, added in an interview.

The Afghan ambassador to Tajikistan on Wednesday rejected Taliban rule of his country and said hold-out Panjshir province, north of Kabul, would serve as a stronghold for resistance led by self-proclaimed acting president Amrullah Saleh. Afghan First Vice-President Saleh said on Tuesday he was the “legitimate caretaker president” of Afghanistan after President Ashraf Ghani fled the country as Taliban insurgents took the capital Kabul.Saleh’s whereabouts were unknown.

Panjshir was the home of the Northern Alliance anti-Taliban resistance in the 1990s and is still a hold-out province against Taliban rule.

Lieutenant General Zahir Aghbar, who held senior positions in Afghan state security including chief of police before becoming ambassador, said Ghani was a traitor.

“I cannot say that the Taliban have won the war. No, it was just Dr Ashraf Ghani who gave up power after treacherous talks with the Taliban,” he told Reuters in an interview.

The militants were able to overrun most of the country because the Afghan military was poorly trained, Aghbar said.

“And only Panjshir resists, led by Vice President Amrullah Saleh,” he said. “Panjshir stands strong against anyone who wants to enslave people.”

In their first official news conference in Kabul, the Taliban has promised to respect the rights of women, seek good relations with other countries and not to extract retribution on former members of the Afghan military.

The Taliban seized power in Afghanistan after the US-backed Afghan government collapsed and President Ghani fled the country, bringing an unprecedented end to a two-decade campaign in which the US and its allies had tried to transform the war-ravaged nation.

In a Facebook post, Ghani said he had left the country to avoid clashes with the Taliban that would endanger millions of residents of Kabul.

He reportedly fled from Kabul with four cars and a helicopter full of cash,Following this, at least seven people, who clung to a US Air Force plane to escape the Taliban rule in Afghanistan, died on August 16 in a melee at the Kabul airport, as hundreds of people scrambled to board flights in a desperate bid to get out of Afghanistan.

This included three Afghan nationals, who reportedly fell to death from the sky as they failed in their bid to flee from the country. Meanwhile, the Taliban have agreed to allow “safe passage” from Afghanistan for civilians struggling to join a US-directed airlift from the capital, according to President Joe Biden’s national security adviser.

Earlier on August 15, the spokesman for the Taliban’s political office said the war in Afghanistan is over and that the type of rule and form of new regime will be clear soon. Speaking on the situation, United Nations

Secretary-General Antonio Guterres has said that he is ‘deeply concerned’ about the situation in Afghanistan and urged the Taliban to exercise utmost restraint.