Supervisor Elham AbolFateh
Editor in Chief Mohamed Wadie

Johnson Vows to Help Those Left behind in Afghanistan


Fri 27 Aug 2021 | 11:32 PM
Omnia Ahmed

British Prime Minister Boris Johnson vowed, on Friday, to “shift heaven and earth” to bring more Afghans to the UK once Britain’s airlift from Kabul airport ends in the coming hours.

Johnson said he felt a "great sense of regret" about those left behind in Afghanistan.

"Of course, as we come down to the final hours of the operation, there will sadly be people who haven't got through, people who might qualify," Johnson affirmed.

"What I would say to them is that we will shift heaven and earth to help them get out; we will do whatever we can in the second phase," the prime minister emphasized.

He added that "the timing of this is certainly not the one that this country would have chosen, and I think that everybody understands that."

Britain has evacuated almost 14,000 UK citizens and Afghans from Kabul in the two-week operation, but the final flights are departing on Friday. Hundreds of UK troops at the airport are due to leave in the next few days. In addition, the US is withdrawing troops by the end of the month.

They have been running the airport in the capital Kabul, where at least 95 people - including two British nationals and the child of a British national - were killed in a suicide bomb attack on Thursday.