“If we don’t sort this out, we’ll literally be condemning people to death,” said Marina Kielpinski LeGree, the American head of the nonprofit Ascend.
The U.S. mission to evacuate 5,000 to 9,000 people a day from a future under Taliban rule in Afghanistan struggled to gain speed Thursday at the Kabul airport, where armed checkpoints and paperwork issues compounded other obstacles, the Associated Press reported. With the August 31 evacuation deadline less than two weeks away, tens of thousands of people still need to be rescued, but according to AP, no accurate count for Americans, Afghans and others exists. The State Department told reporters that fewer than 4,000 Americans had registered for security updates when it withdrew its nonessential embassy staff from Kabul in April after President Joe Biden ‘s withdrawal announcement. But the real number, which includes people with dual U.S.-Afghan citizenship and their families, is likely between 11,000 and 15,000, along with potentially tens of thousands of Afghans. For more reporting from the Associated Press, see below. Taliban fighters and their checkpoints ringed the airport—major barriers for Afghans who fear that their past work with Westerners makes them prime targets for retribution. Hundreds of Afghans who lacked any papers or clearance for evacuation also congregated outside the airport, adding to the chaos that has prevented even some Afghans who do have papers and promises of flights from getting through. It didn’t help that many of the Taliban fighters could not read the documents. In one hopeful sign, State Department spokesman Ned Price said in Washington that 6,000 people were cleared for evacuation Thursday and were expected to board military flights in coming hours. That would mark a major increase from recent days. About 2,000 passengers were flown out on each of the past two days, Pentagon spokesman John Kirby said. Kirby said the military has aircraft available to evacuate 5,000 to 9,000 people per day, but until Thursday far fewer designated evacuees had been able to reach, and then enter, the airport.
