Taliban pledges peaceful relation, US to airlift 9,000 daily

Following the takeover of the Kabul airport in Afghanistan by the United State forces, the US says it will step up the pace of evacuations from the airport.

Aljazeera reports that Major General William Taylor of the Pentagon added that the plan was to have one plane travelling out every hour by Wednesday.

US military flights evacuating diplomats and civilians from Afghanistan which restarted on Tuesday after they were suspended due to chaos at the airfield have airlifted about 1,400 people out of a combination of US citizens and Afghans who qualify under the US special immigrant visa, as well as people from other countries.

Taylor also said there would be ‘approximately 4,000 troops on the ground’ by the end of Tuesday with more to come in.

He said the airport was secure, and that the US mission hoped to be able to evacuate between 5,000 and 9,000 people a day until the White House mandated the end of the mission in August 31.

Meanwhile, the Afghan Taliban said on Tuesday they wanted peaceful relations with other countries and would respect the rights of women within the framework of Islamic law, as the new government held their first official briefing since their shock seizure of Kabul.

Reuters reports that the Taliban’s announcements, short on details but suggesting a softer line than during their rule 20 years ago, came as the United States and Western allies evacuated diplomats and civilians.

During their 1996 to 2001 rule, also guided by Islamic law or Sharia, the Taliban stopped women from working and administered punishments including public stoning.

Girls were not allowed to go to school and women had to wear all-enveloping burqas to go out.

“We don’t want any internal or external enemies,” the movement’s main spokesman, Zabihullah Mujahid, said on Tuesday.

“Women will be allowed to work and study and will be very active in society but within the framework of Islam.

“We will not seek retribution against former soldiers and members of the Western-backed government.

“Nobody is going to harm you, nobody is going to knock on your doors. There is a huge difference between the Taliban now and 20 years ago,” he added.

However, a United Nations spokesman, Stephane, Dujarric told reporters in New York in response to the Taliban news conference, “We will need to see what actually happens and I think we will need to see acts on the ground in terms of promises kept.”