AFGHANISTAN EXIT

122,000 people have been evacuated from Kabul since July, including 5,400 Americans. He said it will continue to be possible to evacuate US citizens still in Afghanistan to the last moment.

“The mission of the evacuation operation was to help as many people as possible leave Afghanistan,” he said.

Tuesday’s deadline for all troops to leave was ordered by Biden, fulfilling an agreement reached with the Taliban by his predecessor Donald Trump to end Washington’s longest war.

The Taliban will take full control of Kabul airport after the American withdrawal on Tuesday, Qatar’s Al Jazeera television network cited an unidentified Taliban member as saying.

“This is the most dangerous time in an already extraordinarily dangerous mission these last couple of days,” said America’s top diplomat, secretary of state Antony Blinken.

The White House said that about 1,200 people were evacuated from Kabul over the prior 24 hours aboard 26 US military flights and two allied flights.

In a statement, the US Central Command said it was looking into the reports of civilian casualties that may have been caused by secondary explosions in the drone strike. An Afghan official said three children were killed in the strike.

It was the second airstrike in recent days the US has conducted against the militant group. The Pentagon said a US drone mission in eastern Afghanistan killed two members of IS’ Afghanistan affiliate early Saturday local time in retaliation for the airport bombing.

The White House has rescheduled Biden’s meeting with Ukraine’s president, Volodymyr Zelenskyy, from Monday to Wednesday as the US pullout from Afghanistan enters its tense final hours.