Fogbow

Taliban members escorted Americans to gates at Kabul airport in secret arrangement with US

Slim Cognito wrote: ↑Wed Sep 01, 2021 7:30 am Now Biden and the Pentagon (may) have to put together a dangerous rescue mission for the stupid mofo.

Reality Check wrote: ↑Wed Sep 01, 2021 10:55 am

Slim Cognito wrote: ↑Wed Sep 01, 2021 7:30 am Now Biden and the Pentagon (may) have to put together a dangerous rescue mission for the stupid mofo.

Assumes a fact not in evidence that the Taliban would want to keep him.

Frater I*I wrote: ↑Wed Sep 01, 2021 12:37 pm

Reality Check wrote: ↑Wed Sep 01, 2021 10:55 am

Slim Cognito wrote: ↑Wed Sep 01, 2021 7:30 am Now Biden and the Pentagon (may) have to put together a dangerous rescue mission for the stupid mofo.

Assumes a fact not in evidence that the Taliban would want to keep him.

Taliban call to the WH: "Yes we have a Republican congressman...hello...hello...they hung up..."

Slim Cognito wrote: ↑Wed Sep 01, 2021 5:08 pm Refresh my memory re the equipment left behind in Syria, did they have time to de-militarize it?

Oklahoma congressman threatened embassy staff as he tried to enter Afghanistan, U.S. officials say
By Tyler Pager and John Hudson Today at 5:42 p.m. EDT

The call to the U.S. ambassador to Tajikistan came in Monday. On the line, two U.S. officials said, was Rep. Markwayne Mullin (R-Okla.) with an unusual and urgent request: He needed assistance in transporting a huge amount of cash into the country, saying he was going to neighboring Afghanistan to rescue five American citizens, a woman and her four children, stuck in the country. They planned to hire a helicopter for the effort.

Mullin told the embassy that he planned to fly from Tbilisi, Georgia, into Tajikistan’s capital, Dushanbe, in the next few hours and needed the top diplomat’s help, according to the two U.S. officials familiar with the incident, who spoke on the condition of anonymity to disclose private conversations about a sensitive matter.

The answer was no. Embassy officials told Mullin they could not assist him in skirting Tajikistan’s laws on cash limits on his way to visiting one of the most dangerous places on earth.

Mullin was outraged by the response, the officials said — threatening U.S. Ambassador John Mark Pommersheim and embassy staff and demanding to know the name of staff members he was speaking with.

The episode marked Mullin’s second attempt to travel to Afghanistan in as many weeks for an unauthorized evacuation effort despite the perilous security environment. Last week, Mullin traveled to Greece and asked the Defense Department for permission to visit Kabul. The Pentagon denied Mullin’s request, an administration official said.

Volkonski wrote: ↑Wed Sep 01, 2021 4:31 pm https:// twitter.com/AJEnglish/status/1433035831254650882

Al Jazeera English @AJEnglish
The Taliban were disappointed to find inoperable planes and helicopters left behind by American forces on the military side of the Kabul airport.
295.4K views
1:32 / 2:07
1:55 PM · Sep 1, 2021

Female TV anchor who interviewed Taliban flees Afghanistan
Beheshta Arghand, now in Qatar, says militants started targeting women soon after takeover

Hannah Ellis-Petersen and agencies
Thu 2 Sep 2021 00.46 BST

She made headlines across the world as the first female journalist to interview a Taliban leader after the fall of Kabul, prompting many to wonder whether the militants had truly adopted more moderate and respectful attitude towards women’s rights.

But for Afghan television anchor Beheshta Arghand, in the days that followed that seemingly historic moment, the true colours of the new Taliban regime were revealed. Fearing for her life and her freedoms, the 24-year-old has since fled to Qatar, and described how the Taliban were already oppressing female journalists.

“Women – Taliban they don’t accept,” Arghand told Reuters from Qatar. “When a group of people don’t accept you as a human, they have some picture in their mind of you, it’s very difficult.”

Arghand’s television interview, with a senior official for the Taliban live on air, was a propaganda coup for the militants that made headlines around the world. The Taliban official had turned up in the studio uninvited on 17 August, two days after the fall of Kabul, and requested to be interviewed.

“I saw that they came [to the Tolo News television station]. I was shocked, I lost my control … I said to myself that maybe they came to ask why did I come to the studio,” she recounted.

Despite her shock, Arghand – who had been a presenter on the Afghan news channel for just over a month – had adjusted her headscarf, checked her clothes to make sure no part of her body was showing and began firing off her questions. She drew accolades for the calm and composed interaction and the moment was later described as “unimaginable” compared with when the Taliban last ruled Afghanistan from 1996 to 2001, when women were denied the ability to study, work or even go out on their own.

But Arghand said that off-camera, the moderate facade of the Taliban soon fell, and in the following days her life turned into a nightmare. The Taliban ordered Tolo news to make all women wear a hijab, a scarf closely covering their heads but leaving the face uncovered. The Taliban also suspended female anchors in other stations.


https://www.theguardian.com/world/2021/ ... fghanistan

Slim Cognito wrote: ↑Wed Sep 01, 2021 8:49 pm https://www.azcentral.com/story/news/lo ... 680301001/

Guess Mullin is on his way home but nobody seems to know what happened.

Exclusive: Before Afghan collapse, Biden pressed Ghani to ‘change perception’
By Aram Roston and Nandita Bose

WASHINGTON, Aug 31 (Reuters) - In the last call between U.S. President Joe Biden and his Afghanistan counterpart before the Taliban seized control of the country, the leaders discussed military aid, political strategy and messaging tactics, but neither Biden nor Ashraf Ghani appeared aware of or prepared for the immediate danger of the entire country falling to insurgents, a transcript reviewed by Reuters shows.

The men spoke for roughly 14 minutes on July 23. On August 15, Ghani fled the presidential palace, and the Taliban entered Kabul. Since then, tens of thousands of desperate Afghans have fled and 13 U.S. troops and scores of Afghan civilians were killed in a suicide bombing at the Kabul airport during the frenetic U.S. military evacuation.



https://www.reuters.com/world/exclusive ... 021-08-31/