Biden battered amid growing rightwing frenzy over Afghan refugees
Source : the times of India |
WASHINGTON: US President
Joe Bidenis battling a serious loss of personal credibility and political capital after some of his assertions on
Afghanistanhave been contradicted — by his own administration, by the US military, and by ground realities.
Bumbling through a
White Housepress conference on Friday, Biden claimed that the US mission in Afghanistan was essentially over since Osama bin Laden had been killed and al-Qaida was "gone" from the country, but Pentagon officials said soon after that al-Qaida, as well as ISIS, remain a presence in Afghanistan. In a report released in June, the United Nations too said
Talibanand al-Qaida remain closely aligned and show no indication of breaking ties.
"Member States report no material change to this relationship, which has grown deeper as a consequence of personal bonds of marriage and shared partnership in struggle, now cemented through second generational ties," the UN report had said.
Administration officials later finessed the President's remarks saying he meant al-Qaida had been degraded to the point where it longer presented a threat to the homeland, but critics pilloried the President for a verbal overreach to justify the hasty US withdrawal that his supporters pin on commitments made by his predecessor Donald Trump.
Biden also suggested that Americans stranded in Afghanistan could get to the Kabul airport for evacuation without much difficulty and Taliban was being cooperative in letting them through, but ground reports spoke of a hurdles on this front with sporadic attacks on Americans trying to reach the airport.
In fact, the US Embassy on Friday explicitly asked its citizens to avoid traveling to the airport because of potential security threats outside the gates, "unless you receive individual instructions from a US government representative to do so."
Amid the chaos on the Afghanistan front, the President is being panned for returning to his vacation although aides say he remains
on top of the situation, pointing to his return to the White House on Friday and the fact that his home state Delaware where he repaired to on Saturday is barely an hour away from the capital.
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