On the eve of the 20th anniversary of the 9/11 attacks in the United States, which marked the end of their regime in Afghanistan, the Taliban are trying to consolidate their power in the country, where flights resumed. evacuation of citizens.
On Thursday a plane with a hundred foreigners and Afghans on board landed in Doha and this Friday another flight to Qatar took off with 49 French and members of their families on board.
The people evacuated on Thursday were the first to be able to leave the country since the massive and chaotic evacuations ended, in which 123,000 people left in two weeks, just before foreign troops concluded their withdrawal. of Afghanistan.
This resumption of flights embodies a promise that, according to US Secretary of State Antony Blinken, the Taliban made to foreign interlocutors: that people who want to leave the country can do so.
This Friday, there were Afghans who flocked to the airport area in hopes of being able to board a plane and flee the Taliban.
“If I can’t leave, kill me and go,” said a woman accompanied by her children to the Taliban who cut her off.
“I’m Taliban and I don’t kill people. I don’t understand people. Why don’t they stay and work? That’s crazy,” the Taliban official replied at the airport entrance.
The U.S. government acknowledged Thursday that the Taliban had shown “flexibility” and had been “professional” about organizing those flights.
– “They looked for an excuse to come” –
It is not known how the Islamist movement, which this week announced the composition of its government, will commemorate Saturday the twentieth anniversary of the 9/11 attacks in the United States, which marked the start of the US offensive that ended his government (1996-2001).
Unconfirmed reports suggest that the Taliban will hold a inauguration ceremony for the new government, which raises suspicions in the international community, which does not consider it representative of Afghan society as it is composed solely of Taliban Pashtun men.
In the United States, the anniversary will have a bitter aftertaste as the country lost about 2,500 soldiers to 20 years of military presence in Afghanistan and spent about $ 2 trillion on the country and eventually the country returned to the hands of those who they had been out of power in 2001 in a matter of weeks.
In the memory of many Afghans, September 11, 2001 is remembered linked to the death of Ahmad Xa Massud, a hero of the resistance during the invasion of the Soviet Union in the 1980s and against the Taliban, assassinated by Al l ‘Qaeda on September 9, 2001.
A few days later, the Afghans learned that Al Qaeda and its leader, Osama bin Laden, who lived in hiding in his own country, had organized the attacks.
The Americans blamed the Taliban, in power since 1996, for protecting Al Qaeda.
“I didn’t think the United States would attack Afghanistan in retaliation” for what has happened, recalls Abdul Rahman, 1 former official. “For me, the United States was a long way off.”
Faced with the Taliban’s refusal to hand over Bin Laden, the United States invaded Afghanistan at the head of a coalition and in a few weeks overthrew the Islamist regime.
“They looked for an excuse to come to Afghanistan. It was an excuse to occupy this land,” accuses Abdul Samad, a librarian in Kandahar (south).
– Dialogue to save lives –
In an interview with AFP, UN Secretary-General Antonio Guterres called on the international community to maintain dialogue with Islamists, stressing the need to avoid an “economic collapse” and the death of millions of people. people.
“We must maintain a dialogue with the Taliban, in which we directly affirm our principles, a dialogue with a sense of solidarity with the Afghan people,” he said.
“Our duty is to extend our solidarity to a people that suffers greatly, and in which millions and millions are at risk of starvation,” Guterres added.
The talks are essential “if we want Afghanistan not to be a center of terrorism, if we want women and girls not to lose all the rights acquired during the previous period, if we want the different ethnic groups to feel represented,” he said. insisted.
According to a World Food Program (WFP) telephone survey conducted on August 21, 93% of Afghan families do not have enough food.
Unesco also warned of a “generational catastrophe” in education in Afghanistan, as the “immense progress” made in this area since 2001 is “in jeopardy” following the Taliban’s return to power. .