US focused on securing Kabul airport after chaos

The United States will focus on securing the Kabul airport and additional US forces will flow into the airport on Monday and Tuesday, US Deputy National Security Adviser Jon Finer said, as people tried to flee a day after Taliban insurgents seized the Afghan capital. The United States has temporarily halted all evacuation flights from Kabul to clear people who had converged on the airfield, a US defense official said, but did not say how long the pause would last. The defense official said the United States aims get tens of thousands of at-risk Afghans who worked for the US government out of Afghanistan and was looking at temporarily housing them at Fort McCoy in Wisconsin and Fort Bliss in Texas. Five people were killed in chaos at Kabul airport on Monday, witnesses said, as people tried to flee after Taliban insurgents seized Kabul and declared the war against foreign and local forces over. The United States was focused intensively on securing the Kabul airport on Monday, US Deputy National Security Adviser Jon Finer said. The goal was to continue civilian evacuation flights for American citizens in Afghanistan, Afghans who worked alongside the US over the past 20 years and for other particularly vulnerable Afghans, he said. Additional US forces will be flowing into the airport on Monday and Tuesday to provide security, Finer added.<br/>