Chaos and confusion continue outside Kabul airport as people seek to flee

CNN

By Jennifer Hansler, Clarissa Ward, Brent Swails and Kara Fox, CNN

Chaotic scenes played out around Kabul airport again on Friday as thousands desperate to leave Afghanistan sought to reach evacuation flights.

In the days since the Afghan capital fell to the Taliban, the United States has scrambled to secure the Hamid Karzai International Airport and evacuate US citizens and vulnerable Afghans amid the extremely fluid situation on the ground.

Military and diplomatic efforts are underway to press the Taliban to ensure safe passage for those trying to reach the airport, but for now the route there is fraught with uncertainty for Afghans looking to flee, as they must first make their way through often violent and arbitrary Taliban checks.

The US Embassy in Kabul has advised Americans that it “cannot ensure safe passage to the airport,” and Defense and State Department officials have said they do not have the capacity to retrieve US citizens from Kabul and bring them to the airport for evacuation flights.

Those who are able to reach the airport perimeter have reported waiting hours to enter and the US Embassy advised in a recent security alert that “due to large crowds and security concerns, gates may open or close without notice.”

“Please use your best judgment and attempt to enter the airport at any gate that is open,” it said.

Afghans who make it through the gates are then subjected to further scrutiny by Afghan special forces, who are facing accusations of similar brutality.

CNN’s Clarissa Ward spoke with some of the people who had made it that far on Friday.

One couple, who said they had worked for Afghanistan’s Ministry of Defense and had applied for a US visa to leave, told Ward that they were fleeing because there was no future for them in Afghanistan under Taliban rule. Their work with foreign nationals put them at risk, they said.

“We are not able to work with them [the Taliban,]” the woman said, adding, “the behavior they have to women and men is not good for us — it is not good for our future.”

As the couple continued to speak, an army vehicle drove past them, carrying a newborn baby. It was being treated for dehydration and heat stroke, a soldier told Ward.

Young children are increasingly getting caught up in the mayhem, with a harrowing video of a baby being handed over the razor wire-lined airport wall to US troops going viral.

On Thursday, the UK Defense Secretary Ben Wallace said that Britain cannot evacuate unaccompanied children. Wallace was responding to pictures that had emerged of mothers handing over their babies to British soldiers across barbed wire at the airport earlier in the week.

On Friday, the CNN team also witnessed one US soldier carrying an unaccompanied minor through a visa processing area as the roar of an evacuation plane’s engine intensified.

Those who are able to make it onto US government evacuation flights will not be required to pay for them, the State Department confirmed Friday.

“In these unique circumstances, we have no intention of seeking any reimbursement from those fleeing Afghanistan,” spokesperson Ned Price said in a statement.

3,000 people were evacuated on Thursday, including American citizens and their families, Special Immigrant Visa applicants and their families, and other vulnerable Afghans, a White House official said overnight, and 9,000 people have been evacuated since Saturday,

Hours earlier, State Department spokesperson Ned Price said that there were 6,000 people at the airport who were fully processed and waiting to board flights.

Thursday’s evacuation numbers fall well short of the Defense Department’s stated goal of 5,000 to 9,000 people per day.

White House communications director Kate Bedingfield told CNN’s Briana Keilar that the White House does not have a precise count of Americans who are still in Afghanistan.

She said the administration is still trying to account for Americans who may have left the country prior to Aug. 14 without notifying the US embassy.

On Thursday, State Department spokesperson Price said that they have “notified all Americans who had expressed an interest in being relocated to consider traveling to the airport,” as well as locally employed staff and “a segment of the SIV population.”

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CNN’s Will Bonnett, Allie Malloy and Ellie Kaufman contributed to this report.