PATROL: Taliban fighters on a motorcycle in the Afghan city of Ghazni on Thursday. The city is just one of a number of cities the Taliban have hijacked in recent days. Foto: Gulabuddin Amiri / AP
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The Taliban insurgency has captured Kandahar, the second largest city in Afghanistan. The group itself claims to have control of the city – as well as the third largest city in the country.
City after city has fallen under Taliban control. With only hours to go, the Afghan authorities lost some of their most important cities: Herat, Ghazni and Qala – Naw all fell on Thursday.
Late Thursday night, the Taliban then made allegations that they had captured Kandahar. The messages came to the news agency AP via what they refer to as local sources.
“Kandahar is completely conquered,” a Taliban spokesman told the BBC on Friday night.
According to the AP, the sources would be anonymous, because the fall of the city has not yet been acknowledged by the government. They are said to have said that and that the local authorities in the city managed to escape the city with their entourage and escape by plane from the airport.
Pictures on social media have shown militants from the Taliban in the streets of Kandahar on Thursday. Already the day before, they had broken into and taken over the prison in the city.
The allegations have so far not been confirmed by the Afghan authorities.
Strategically important
The Taliban now have control over most of northern Afghanistan, taking over more and more strategically important cities. The most recent of these is Kandahar – the city where the Taliban originated.
The city also has an international airport, and is an important hub for trade in the country.
– The worst is about to happen, warned the Norwegian Chief of Defense Eirik Kristoffersen in VG Thursday.
—-ABANDONED: A market in Kandahar is far more empty than usual as a result of the conflict between Afghan forces and the Taliban in several places in the country. The picture is from Tuesday this week. Photo: M. SADIQ / EPA
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He fears that developments in the country could mean full civil war.
Til Al Jazeerasays another spokesman for the group that the large number of cities that have fallen under Taliban control shows that “the Afghan people welcome them.
The Security Council is considering condemnation
On Friday night, the news agency Reuters reports that a statement condemning the Taliban’s advance in Afghanistan is up for discussion in the UN Security Council. The draft statement will be outlined by Estonia and Norway.
– The UN declares that we do not support, and will not support, the establishment of any authority in Afghanistan that is introduced through military force, it is stated according to Reuters in the draft.
—-ON WATCH: A Taliban fighter at the entrance to the police headquarters in Ghazni. Photo: AFP
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Reuters also reports that US Secretary of State Antony Blinken has been in talks with foreign ministers in several partner countries – as well as with NATO chief Jens Stoltenberg.
On Thursday, it also became known that Both the United States and Britain are sending additional forces to help their citizens out of the country. Almost all of the staff at the US Embassy are being evacuated.
600 British and 3000 American forces are sent into the country to evacuate, among others, their ambassadors and diplomats in the country.
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