International

KABUL: Some Kabul residents cautiously ventured back to work through quiet streets on Tuesday, fearful after a night broken by the sound of gunfire and facing questions from their new Taliban rulers stationed at checkpoints across the Afghan capital. The Taliban, who stopped women from working and administered punishments including public stoning during their previous 1996-2001 rule, swept the country …

More than 2,200 diplomats and other civilians have been evacuated from Afghanistan on military flights, a Western security official told Reuters on Wednesday, as efforts gathered pace to get people out after the Taliban seized the capital. The Taliban have said they want peace, will not take revenge against old enemies and would respect the rights of women within the framework of Islamic …

Girls wearing white hijabs and black tunics crammed into classrooms in the western Afghan city of Herat just days after the Taliban’s takeover. As the school opened its doors, the students scurried down corridors and chatted in courtyards, seemingly oblivious to the turmoil that has engulfed the country in the past two weeks. The scenes — which many feared would be …

With Pakistan maintaining that the decision to recognise the Taliban regime in Afghanistan should be a regional one, Federal Minister Shah Mahmood Qureshi informed his Chinese counterpart, Wang Yi, on Wednesday that he would be making visits to other countries to develop a “regional consensus on the evolving situation in Afghanistan”. A statement issued by the Ministry of Foreign Affairs …

The Biden administration froze about $9.5 billion of the Afghan government’s reserves in US banks on Sunday after the Taliban seized Kabul, according to US media reports. The undeclared action was first reported by The Washington Post on Tuesday. The Post reported that US Treasury Secretary Janet Yellen and personnel at the Treasury’s Office of Foreign Assets Control had decided to freeze the accounts. “Any central bank …

UNITED NATIONS: Pak­is­tan on Monday condemned India’s ‘obstructionist actions’ and ‘hatred’ for the country as New Delhi once again blocked its effort to participate in a UN Security Council (UNSC) debate on the Afghan situation. India, the council’s current president, however, allowed the ambassador of the Ashraf Ghani government to address the emergency session. Pakistan and Afghanistan had both submitted …

WASHINGTON: The Taliban will be denied access to any Afghan reserves held in US accounts, a US administration official said on Monday. As US forces were evacuating Afghanistan’s capital after the Taliban’s swift takeover, the official said: “Any Central Bank assets the Afghan government have in the United States will not be made available to the Taliban.” The central bank’s …

US President Joe Biden said on Monday he stood “squarely behind” his decision to withdraw US troops from Afghanistan despite searing images of chaos in Kabul that exposed the limits of US power and plunged him into the worst crisis of his presidency. Breaking his silence on the US pullout after scenes of bedlam dominated television news channels for days, …

MOSCOW: Russia’s emba­ssy in Kabul said on Monday that Afghan President Ash­raf Ghani had fled the country with four cars and a helicopter full of cash and had to leave some money behind as it would not all fit in, the RIA news agency reported. Ghani, whose current whereabouts are unknown, said he left Afghanistan on Sunday as the Taliban entered Kabul …

The US has reached out to Pakistan and half a dozen other countries it believes can influence the situation in Afghanistan, where the Taliban appear to be consolidating their hold after capturing Kabul. The foreign ministers of Pakistan, China, Russia, India and Turkey and the foreign secretary of Britain were among the top diplomats the US Secretary of State Antony Blinken …