Biden says US troops to stay in Afghanistan until ‘every American is evacuated’

The decision has come as 5,000 people were evacuated from Kabul’s airport and armed members of the Taliban kept some Afghans desperate to leave the country from reaching the airfield.

"If there's American citizens left, we're gonna stay to get them all out," he said adding that around 10,000 and 15,000 Americans needed to be evacuated, along with 50,000 to 65,000 Afghans such as former translators for the American military.

US Defense Secretary Lloyd Austin has said that the set target for evacuations has not been completed as yet and the US military does not have the forces and firepower in Afghanistan to collect Americans and at-risk Afghans elsewhere in the capital and escorting them for evacuation.

Earlier on Tuesday, Joe Biden stated that he stands “squarely behind” his decision to withdraw US troops from Afghanistan despite the bipartisan criticism over the collapse of afghan government and the ensuing chaos — speaking from the White House.

Biden said that Taliban took control of the country more quickly than he expected, although he took little responsibility for that.

He termed the images of Afghans at Kabul’s international airport trying to flee their country ‘gut-wrenching’.

 “If anything, the developments in the past week reinforced that ending US military involvement in Afghanistan now was the right decision,” he said.

“American troops cannot and should not be fighting in a war, and dying in a war, that Afghan forces are not willing to fight for themselves,” he added.