Afghan President Ashraf Ghani on Wednesday defended his decision to flee Kabul in the face of the Taliban advance, describing it as the only way to prevent bloodshed. He also denied claims by his country's ambassador to Tajikistan that he had stolen millions of dollars from state funds. Ghani posted a video on his Facebook page late on Wednesday, confirming that he was in the United Arab Emirates.
He thanked Afghan security forces in his message, but also said that the failure of the peace process led to the Taliban snatching power. He also indirectly tried to quash an accusation by Afghanistan's ambassador to Tajikistan that he had stolen $169 million from state funds. He claimed that he was "forced to leave Afghanistan with one set of traditional clothes, a vest and the sandals I was wearing".
"Accusations were made that money was transferred, these accusations are fully baseless," he said. Ghani left Afghanistan on Sunday just as the Taliban approached Kabul.
Meanwhile, in another development, Taliban militants attacked protesters on Wednesday in eastern Afghanistan who dared to take down their banner and replace it with the country's flag, killing at least one person and fueling fears about how the insurgents would govern this fractious nation. While the Taliban have insisted they will respect human rights unlike during their previously draconian rule, the attack in Jalalabad comes as many Afghans are hiding at home or trying to flee the country as allegations of abuses by the loosely controlled militant organisation grow.
Many have expressed dread that the two-decade Western experiment to remake Afghanistan will not survive the resurgent Taliban, who took control of the country in a blitz that took just days. Taliban leaders talked on Wednesday with senior Afghan officials about a future government. In a potential complication to any effort to stabilise the country, the Central Bank chief warned that American sanctions over the Taliban's terror designations threatened Afghanistan's economy, which already is dangerously low on hard foreign currency.
In an early sign of protest to the Taliban's rule, dozens gathered in the eastern city of Jalalabad and a nearby market town to raise the tricolor national flag, a day before Afghanistan's Independence Day, which commemorates the 1919 treaty that ended British rule. They lowered the Taliban flag, a white banner with an Islamic inscription that the militants have raised in the areas they captured. Video footage later showed the Taliban firing into the air and attacking people with batons to disperse the crowd. Babrak Amirzada, a reporter for a local news agency, said the Taliban beat him and a TV cameraman from another agency.
A local health official said the violence killed at least one person and wounded six. The official spoke on condition of anonymity as he wasn't authorised to brief journalists. The Taliban did not acknowledge the protest or the violence. It was a rare resistance to their rule. In the days since the Taliban seized Kabul on Sunday, the militants only faced one other protest by a few women in the capital.
Still, there's been no armed opposition to the Taliban. However, videos from the Panjshir Valley north of Kabul, a stronghold of the Northern Alliance militias that allied with the US during the 2001 invasion of Afghanistan, appear to show potential opposition figures gathering there. That area is in the only province that hasn't yet fallen to the Taliban.
Those figures include members of the deposed government Vice President Amrullah Saleh, who asserted on Twitter that he is the country's rightful president and Defense Minister Gen. Bismillah Mohammadi as well as Ahmad Massoud, the son of the slain Northern Alliance leader Ahmad Shah Massoud. It remained unclear what they're next steps would be.
Trying to flee the country by air, hundreds of people remained outside Kabul's airport on Wednesday, already the scene of deadly chaos. The Taliban demanded to see documents before allowing the rare passenger inside. Many of the people outside did not appear to have passports, and each time the gate opened even an inch, dozens tried to push through. The Taliban fired occasional warning shots to disperse them.
The Taliban have promised to maintain security, but residents say groups of armed men have been going door to door inquiring about Afghans who worked with the Americans or the deposed government. It's unclear if the gunmen are Taliban or criminals posing as militants.