U.S. sends troops to evacuate diplomats in Afghanistan

As the Taliban sweeps across Afghanistan capturing key provincial capitals, the United States has decided personnel at its embassy in Kabul are no longer safe. Afghan government forces are collapsing quickly as the United States carries out a full troop withdrawal by Aug. 31. Now the United States is sending in an additional 3,000 Army and Marine troops to help partially evacuate the embassy in the Afghan capital.

Will Kabul fall to the Taliban? The Islamist militant group has seized 14 major cities and effectively controls more than two-thirds of the country. It ruled Afghanistan from 1996 until after the 9/11 attacks, when the United States sent troops to dismantle terrorist training networks in the country. Biden said the U.S. military was withdrawing its troops because it had accomplished its mission of ensuring Afghanistan would not be used as a base for terror attacks on the United States.

Dig deeper: Read Onize Ohikere’s report in World Tour about increasing attacks in Afghanistan as the U.S. withdrawal began.