Evacuations from Kabul: Spain ends efforts, Britain to end own ‘in matter of hours’

Medical and hospital staff carry an injured man out of a car for treatment after two blasts, which killed at least five and wounded a dozen, outside the airport in Kabul on August 26, 2021. (Photo by Wakil KOHSAR / AFP)

Madrid, Spain/London, United Kingdom — Spain said Friday that it has ended its evacuation operations out of Kabul following the arrival of “the last two Spanish flights” in Dubai, just over a week after it began airlifting its citizens in the wake of the Taliban’s takeover of Afghanistan.

“A military A400 plane arrived in Dubai from Kabul at 7:20 am. A second is due to land at 8:20 am. With these two flights, the Spanish evacuation of its Afghan collaborators and their families has been completed,” the government said in a statement.

Meanwhile, Britain said Friday that it plans to complete its evacuations out of Afghanistan “in a matter of hours.”

“We will process those people that we have brought with us, the 1,000 people approximately inside the airfield now,” British Defence Secretary Ben Wallace told Sky News. “And we will seek a way to continue to find a few people in the crowd, where we can, but overall the main processing has now closed and we have a matter of hours.”