Taliban rings airport; protests turn violent in Afghanistan, three dead

Sharp objects, sticks used to beat women and children, who were desperately trying to enter Kabul airport

At least three people were killed in anti-Taliban protests in the Afghan city of Jalalabad on Wednesday, witnesses said, as the militant group tried to set up a government and Western countries stepped up evacuations of diplomats and civilians. 

Over a dozen people were injured after Taliban militants opened fire on protesters in the eastern city, two witnesses and a former police official told Reuters. The witnesses said the deaths took place when local residents tried to install Afghanistan's national flag at a square in Jalalabad, some 150 km (90 miles) from the capital on the main road to Pakistan.

Taliban spokesmen were not immediately reachable for comment.

Dozens of people gathered in the eastern city of Jalalabad to raise the national flag a day before Afghanistan’s Independence Day, which commemorates the end of British rule in 1919. 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. Meanwhile, videos from the Panjshir Valley north of Kabul appear to show potential opposition figures gathering there. It’s in the only province that hasn’t yet fallen to the Taliban.

Taliban fighters patrol the Wazir Akbar Khan neighborhood | Photo: AP

Attacks women, children with whips

The Taliban used whips, sticks, ropes and rifles to beat women and children trying to flee Afghanistan in violent scenes at Kabul airport on Tuesday, accordingto a report by Los Angeles Times.

LA Times reporter Marcus Yam posted pictures where women and children were carried away covered in blood, with at least a dozen people wounded. Militant fighters opened fire at crowds crossing the streets surrounding Hamid Karzai International Airport as they tried to reach the tarmac. 

At least 17 people were injured at Kabul airport on Wednesday, a Nato security official confirmed. According to Fox News, Taliban fighters shot and killed a woman for not wearing a burqa in Afghanistan on Tuesday — the same day the group pledged to usher in a new inclusive era in the country that honors “women’s rights.”

Jalalabad's residents returned Afghanistan's national flag on the city’s main square | photo: twitter

Taliban hampers Kabul evacuations

At Kabul airport, crowds of Afghans continued to gather along the perimeter, trying to flee the country. The Taliban once again repulsed these crowds with violence, beating and whipping families trying to get through the checkpoints and unleashing volleys of gunfire in the air, witnesses told The Wall Street Journal.

According to WSJ, beyond the Taliban checkpoints, US Marines at the gates of the airport focused mostly on keeping anyone from coming close. As a result, many of the evacuation flights continued leaving with empty seats. The checkpoints at Hamid Karzai International Airport, the last place under US control, are only to ensure security and prevent people from rushing in after several people died in chaotic scenes on Monday, according to a senior Taliban official.