The coming to power of the Taliban (banned in Russia) in Kabul is a reality that the international community has to reckon with, Russian Foreign Ministry spokeswoman Maria Zakharova said at a briefing on Thursday.
"The Taliban's coming to power in Kabul is a reality that the world community should certainly take into account when building further relations with Afghanistan," she said.
"The outgoing president [Ashraf] Ghani, who was recently discovered in the UAE, is certainly responsible for what happened," the diplomat continued. - "For the past three years, he had every opportunity to ensure the success of the inter-Afghan peace process and facilitate the smooth formation of an inclusive government involving all ethno-political forces in the country, but that chance was missed."
Zakharova pointed out that the Taliban have actively sought to restore order and have demonstrated a willingness to engage in dialogue with influential Afghan political leaders.
Evacuation of Russians and security guarantees
Zakharova said the Taliban gave Russia security guarantees on the issue of charter flights for Russians wishing to leave Afghanistan.
"I would also like to emphasize that there is no question of evacuating embassy personnel or Russian citizens in Afghanistan. We are working as usual on organizing several charter flights. Actually, we did that before, during the coronavirus pandemic, using a local airline. Since there is no such possibility now, we plan to organize special flights, including for Russian citizens wishing to leave Afghanistan. The Taliban representatives assured the Russian side that there are no obstacles to this and gave relevant security guarantees", she said.
Besides, the diplomat emphasized that Russian civil aviation is ready to transport citizens of Afghanistan wishing to leave the country to any other country.
"In the light of the situation currently observed at Kabul airport and the inability of a number of Western states to arrange for the removal of their diplomats, soldiers and civilians from Afghanistan, not to mention cooperating Afghan citizens, their families who want to leave the country but have no such opportunity, would like to report the following: in order to prevent a deterioration of the humanitarian situation in Afghanistan we are ready to provide services of Russian civil aviation to ensure the flight of any number of Afghan citizens, including women and children, to any other country".
Zakharova noted that Russia has no information that Russians might have been injured at Kabul airport.
"We have no information that any citizens of our country have been injured as a result of the well-known events at the Kabul airport in recent days," she said.
Consular work
The consular service of the Russian embassy in Afghanistan is experiencing natural difficulties due to the collapse of the former state system, the Russian Foreign Ministry representative explained.
"In consular work, of course, [there are] certain difficulties related to the collapse of the former state system in Afghanistan. These difficulties are naturally present. For understandable reasons, the legalization of documents has been suspended. I would like to emphasize that this is due to the collapse of the civil service, which previously operated on the territory of Afghanistan," she said.
The representative of the Foreign Ministry also added that about 100 citizens of Russia are on the consular registry in the embassy in Afghanistan.
"There are about 100 Russian citizens in the consular registry, mostly ethnic Afghans who at different times studied in Russia and the Soviet Union, started families, received citizenship and returned to their historic homeland. The consular service of the embassy focuses on working with them and other applications from Russian citizens," she said.
Taliban fighters entered Kabul on August 15 without fighting and took complete control of the Afghan capital within hours. Afghan President Ashraf Ghani said he was leaving the country to avoid bloodshed. Amrullah Saleh, vice-president of the republic, said that in the absence of the head of state, he became acting head of the country under the constitution, and called for armed resistance to the Taliban. Western countries evacuate their citizens and embassy staff.
GSV "Russia - Islamic World"
Photo: Press Service of the Russian Foreign Ministry / TASS
Based on materials from TASS