US on alert for more attacks after dozens killed in Kabul airport carnage
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U.S. forces helping to evacuate Afghans desperate to flee Taliban rule are on alert for more attacks. Two blasts and gunfire rocked the area outside the airport on Thursday evening, as thousands, including journalists, professors, researchers, and members of civil society waited helplessly at the paralysed airport. Nassim Majidi, Director of the Samuel Hall Research Center, has scathing criticism for the US lack of planning and the ensuing chaos: "The US created this crisis, by not planning for this. It was not part of any of their contingency plans." Meanwhile, the Taliban have blocked Afghans from leaving their country. Ms. Majidi insists that "we owe it to all Afghans who are at risk, so all Afghans who want to leave and seek protection abroad should be entitled to it. It's not a question of numbers. The Geneva Conventions don't set a quota of a number of people that are eligible to be refugees. The entire population , if they want to leave, they should be granted the opportunity to leave. It's their universal human rights to leave. And it's the obligation of states to offer them the protection they deserve."