Six aircraft stuck in Afghan airport

About 1,000 people, including Americans, have been stuck in Afghanistan for days awaiting clearance for their charter flights to leave, an organiser told Reuters, blaming the delay on the US State Department.

The confusion was the latest flashpoint following a chaotic US military withdrawal completed after Taliban Islamist insurgents seized power in Kabul on Aug. 15, after the Western-backed government collapsed. Earlier on Sunday, the senior Republican on the US House of Representatives Foreign Affairs Committee, Mike Mccaul, told "Fox News Sunday" that six airplanes were stuck at Mazar-i-sharif airport with Americans and Afghan interpreters aboard, unable to take off as they had not received Taliban clearance.