Ten U.S. citizens and 11 lawful permanent residents were aboard the first commercial flight out of Kabul since the Taliban overthrew the Western-backed Afghan government and U.S. military forces left the country at the end of last month, according to the Biden administration.
State Department spokesman Ned Price confirmed the numbers on Thursday night, the day the flight took off for Doha, Qatar, and noted they had invited 39 people to be on the plane.
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“This is another concrete demonstration of our commitment to assist those to whom we have a special commitment,” he said.
The flight marks a momentous moment for the Biden administration, given the Taliban previously refused to allow flights carrying evacuees even if they were U.S. citizens.
A day earlier, Secretary of State Antony Blinken told reporters at Ramstein Air Base in Germany, “As of now, the Taliban are not permitting the charter flights to depart.”
“Today offers another concrete demonstration” of the “special commitment” they made to help U.S. citizens and others who wanted to depart Afghanistan, Blinken said in a Thursday statement.
The State Department and U.S. Special Rep. Zalmay Khalilzad “have been in regular contact with Taliban officials in recent days,” he added. Blinken noted allowing them to leave would be a positive mark on their résumé to the international community.
“Kabul Airport is now operational,” Mutlaq bin Majed al Qahtani, a special envoy from Qatar’s Ministry of Foreign Affairs, said at a news conference, according to the New York Times.
There are thousands of others, including U.S. citizens, who remain in Afghanistan with the hopes of fleeing the Taliban regime that gained power during an August offensive that saw the Afghan army melt away as the U.S. executed their withdrawal, the Associated Press reported.
Once the Taliban took over Kabul, the U.S. military and allies began a widespread evacuation effort for foreign nationals and Afghans who had helped Western forces who might be targeted by the Taliban. They were able to evacuate approximately 120,000 people in August, with an overwhelming majority coming after the Taliban’s takeover on Aug. 15, according to the Biden administration.
Defense Secretary Lloyd Austin spoke of the pressure the Taliban will face in getting positive recognition from the international community not to provide a haven to terrorist groups.
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“The whole community is kind of watching to see what happens and whether or not al Qaeda has the ability to regenerate in Afghanistan,” Austin said in Kuwait City. “We put the Taliban on notice that we expect them to not allow that to happen.”
“The nature of al Qaeda and [the Islamic State group] is they will always attempt to find space to grow and regenerate, whether it’s there, whether it’s in Somalia, or whether it’s in any other ungoverned space,” he explained. “I think that’s the nature of the organization.”
