Afghan forces abandoned military equipment not United States: John Kirby
WASHINGTON:
A senior US security official John Kirby has blamed the Afghan forces for abandoning military equipment when the Taliban took over the country.
Addressing a press conference on Tuesday, National Security Council (NSC) spokesperson John Kirby said the US did not leave behind any military equipment for terrorist organizations in Afghanistan.
The US official’s statement came after interim Prime Minister Anwaar-ul-Haq Kakar and Ambassador Masood Khan reportedly said the weapons left behind by America had fallen into hands of terrorists.
The equipment — which includes a wide variety of items, from night vision goggles to firearms — is now “emerging as a new challenge” for Islamabad as it has enhanced the fighting capabilities of the Tehreek-e-Taliban Pakistan (TTP), quoted PM Kakar as saying in his interaction with a select group of journalists on Monday.
Kirby, however, denied this and said the US had left only “limited” equipment and aircraft in Kabul. At the airport, he said, America had left trucks and technical and firefighting equipment.
When a journalist drew his attention to reports that the $7 billion worth of weapons in Afghanistan had fallen into the hands of terrorists, the NSC spokesperson said the military equipment being talked about had been actually handed over to the Afghan defence forces.
all that military equipment was for the Afghan defense forces, as it was the US mission to build their capacity and enable them to fulfil their country’s security responsibility themselves, said Kirby, adding that it was the afghan forces that had abandoned the said equipment.
Pakistan has been facing threats of terrorism for a long time, and one significant reason for this is its border with Afghanistan, the NSC spokesperson remarked.
“We know that the Pakistani people continue to suffer the threat from terrorism, particularly along that border, that border with Afghanistan. And we’re going to continue to work with Pakistan to help address those kinds of security threats to their own people and to their own borders because it’s not an insignificant threat. There’s a – there is a lot of danger that’s still posed to the Pakistani people, and the President understands that, and he’s committed to continue to work with Pakistan.”
When asked if President Biden would discuss Kashmir and human rights violations in India during the G20 summit, and how the White House viewed the fact that Pakistan had proposed multiple times to engage in dialogue with India, he said Pakistan and India had to talk om all issues themselves.
“Discussing human rights violations is an essential part of President Biden’s foreign policy and he will never shy away from talking about human rights violations,” Kirby said.
He added that President Biden had talk human rights violations during Indian Prime Minister Modi’s visit to Washington and would not refrain from discussing the issue during his visit to India.