Status: 08/17/2021 11:41 PM
The Bundeswehr evacuation campaign in Kabul is ongoing – the third aircraft with 139 people on board is on its way to the Uzbek capital Tashkent. The first Lufthansa plane to Germany has now started from the hub there.
In the Afghan capital Kabul, a third Bundeswehr machine to evacuate Germans and local personnel was launched on Tuesday evening. Foreign Minister Heiko Maas (SPD) announced on ZDF that there were 139 people on board. Another machine is ready. “At the moment the gates at the airport are closed, as soon as they are open again, we will continue this operation.”
The A400M transport aircraft, which took off from Kabul, will initially fly to the Uzbek capital Tashkent. According to the Foreign Office, people will be brought to Germany by Lufthansa on Wednesday. The Ministry of Defense announced on Twitter that more than 260 people have now been flown out of Afghanistan. “And we will evacuate as long as we can,” emphasized the ministry.
From Tashkent to Germany
The evacuees, who had already arrived in Tashkent in the afternoon, will be “flown from there to Germany at the hour,” Maas tweeted in the evening. The Lufthansa Airbus 340 took off in the evening in Tashkent in the direction of Frankfurt am Main, where it is expected on Wednesday night. Frankfurt Airport announced the landing of a Lufthansa plane from Tashkent at 1:55 a.m. According to information from the dpa news agency, around 130 evacuees from Kabul are on board. The federal government had chartered the long-haul jet.
The first evacuated employees of the embassy in Kabul are already back in Germany. According to dpa information, they landed on Tuesday afternoon with a scheduled plane at Berlin’s Schönefeld Airport. On Monday night they were among the first 40 German citizens who were flown to Doha in the Gulf emirate of Qatar on a US plane.
Difficult situation in Kabul
Foreign Minister Maas said in the evening: “The airlift has started and will be continued intensively if the security situation somehow allows it.” The Taliban are currently only admitting foreign nationals to the airport in Kabul; local staff and other Afghans cannot get to the airport.
The German government therefore wants to endeavor in talks with Taliban representatives to find ways to leave the country for local workers in Afghanistan. The German ambassador in Kabul, Markus Potzel, traveled to the Qatari capital Doha, where US representatives are in talks with Taliban representatives, Maas said. In his talks in Doha, the diplomat wants to work towards “ensuring that local staff can also go to the airport and be flown out.” Two more flights are planned for Wednesday, Maas continued.
Heiko Maas, Federal Foreign Minister, on the evacuation from Kabul
tagesschau24 3:00 p.m., August 17, 2021
Cooperation with the USA
Foreign machines, such as US planes, should also continue to be used to bring Germans to safety. Defense Minister Annegret Kramp-Karrenbauer said that should a permanent airlift, in coordination with the US government, for example, be made, more transport capacities could be made available.
Currently, it is mainly US soldiers who are securing the airport in Kabul. According to the White House, around 3,500 soldiers are now deployed there. The Department of Defense in Washington said the number would rise to around 4,000 during the day. In a few days there should be up to 6,000 soldiers.
Looking for more helpers
The federal government is still looking for Afghan helpers who have not yet been able to leave the country. According to Chancellor Angela Merkel, a large number of the local forces in the Bundeswehr and Federal Police are already in Germany. Now they are trying to establish contact with around 1000 local staff in the field of development cooperation, some of whom are not in Kabul. In addition, there are helpers from non-governmental organizations.
The reason why these were initially not on the list of those to be evacuated was the assumption that development cooperation could initially be continued after the withdrawal of the military, said Merkel. This is no longer possible.