President Joe Biden on Sunday said he still hoped evacuation operations in Kabul could be completed before August 31, the date his government had set for the full withdrawal of US troops from Afghanistan.
"We hope that we will not have to extend,"
said the US president, while leaving the door open for an extension.
"There will be discussions, I think." "We'll see what we can do,"
he replied to a question from a reporter asking what he would do if allied countries demanded that the United States stay there longer.
The head of European diplomacy Josep Borrell had judged Saturday "impossible" to evacuate all the Afghan collaborators of the Western powers before August 31. Several human rights organizations have also called on Joe Biden to extend the deadline for the US withdrawal.
Some 28,000 people have been evacuated since Aug. 14, the White House tenant said on Sunday. "It's an incredible operation," he said. "
We are working hard and as quickly as possible to evacuate people",
he added, assuring that these evacuations would have been
"difficult and painful"
even if they had been started "a month ago". A week after the Taliban took power, thousands of people were still trying to flee the country on Sunday, and chaos still reigned at Kabul airport.
“We've made a number of changes, including expanding access around the airport and the security zone
,
”
Joe Biden said without giving further details.