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Destination: Afghanistan.
Airbus A400M transport aircraft of the Luftwaffe after take-off in Wunsdorf
Photo: Hauke-Christian Dittrich / dpa
The German government is preparing for a longer evacuation mission for German citizens, Afghan local staff and other Afghans at risk after the Taliban invasion. In a briefing for the parliamentary group leaders, Chancellor Angela Merkel and several of her ministers reported that a total of up to 10,000 people are expected to be flown out of Kabul to protect them from the Taliban's revenge.
The Bundeswehr is to receive a robust mandate from the Bundestag for the mission, which started on Monday with the launch of two A400M military aircraft in the direction of Kabul.
Defense Minister Annegret Kramp-Karrenbauer said in the briefing that they wanted to submit a mandate to the Bundestag with an upper limit of 600 men.
The mandate is to be decided by the cabinet on Wednesday and then presented to the Bundestag for discussion.
Presumably, at least according to military circles, not all soldiers will actually be deployed in the mission, but the Bundeswehr wants to secure the flights from Kabul to Tashkent with robust teams.
It is planned that the Bundeswehr soldiers will commute from Kabul to Tashkent several times a day, and the passengers who have flown out will then be brought to Germany in scheduled or charter planes.
The first machine circles over Kabul - and has to turn off
However, the rescue mission experienced a significant setback on the first day of the mission.
One of the German Armed Forces A400M circled over Kabul airport for hours, but was not given a landing permit.
US soldiers deployed there tried feverishly to stabilize the situation at the airport after thousands of Afghans stormed the airfield and clung to US jets taking off and diplomats about to fly out.
The federal government hopes that in the coming days around 80 German citizens who are still staying in Kabul and hundreds of Afghan local workers with their families can still be flown out. The US has signaled that it wants to secure the airport for another two weeks. That would at least give the Bundeswehr a larger time window for flights. However, there is currently no guarantee for this.
Shortly after the briefing, Merkel dampened the prospects of a success for the new Afghanistan mission. "Unfortunately we are no longer fully in control of that," said the Chancellor. Whether and how many local workers could be rescued would depend “on the situation in Kabul” and how long the Taliban would allow such flights at all. Merkel stressed that she would do "everything in her power" to fly out as many German employees as possible.
Interior Minister Horst Seehofer warned, according to participants, that the invasion of the Taliban is likely to trigger a larger refugee movement of Afghans. His ministry expects up to five million Afghans to leave their country and possibly flee to Europe. Whether Seehofer assumes the number of refugees in Germany will rise or how he comes up with the number of possible refugees at all, initially remained open.