LONDON, August 24. /TASS/. The Group of Seven has agreed a joint approach to the evacuation from Afghanistan and insists the Taliban radical movement (outlawed in Russia), which have come to power in that country, ensure safe evacuation from the country after August 31, British Prime Minister Boris Johnson said on Tuesday after an extraordinary online G7 summit.
"Today the G7 agreed, we brought them together, and they agreed a road map for future engagement with the Taliban," he told broadcasters. "But the number one condition that we are insisting upon is safe passage beyond the 31st, beyond this initial phase, for those who want to leave Afghanistan."
Dwelling on the topic of the roadmap for relations with the Taliban, he stressed that Western nations would not render financial assistance to Afghanistan’s new government if its actions run counter to the G7 values. "If those huge funds are going to be unfrozen eventually for use by the government and people of Afghanistan, then what we’re saying is Afghanistan can’t lurch back into becoming a breeding ground of terror, Afghanistan can’t become a narco state, girls have to be educated up to the age of 18, and so on," he said. "Those are important things that we value as G7, those are things that unite us in the West, those are things for which we fought for years in Afghanistan, and for which people in this country gave their lives."
After the Biden administration announced the end of its US military operation in Afghanistan and the launch of its troop pullout, the Taliban (outlawed in Russia) embarked on an offensive against Afghan government forces. On August 15, Taliban fighters swept into Kabul without encountering any resistance, and gained full control over the Afghan capital within a few hours. Afghanistan’s President Ashraf Ghani said he had stepped down to prevent any bloodshed and subsequently fled the country. Vice President Amrullah Saleh said that under the constitution, he becomes "the caretaker president" in the absence of the president and called for armed resistance against the Taliban. Western nations are in the process of evacuating their citizens and embassy staff.