Taliban leader says group’s fighters were ordered to allow safe passage to anyone looking to leave Kabul
The Taliban have begun entering Kabul, Afghanistan’s interior ministry and the armed group said, with Taliban Source confirming to the same.
The development on Sunday came just hours after the group seized control of the key eastern city of Jalalabad, securing critical roads connecting the country to Pakistan.
A Taliban leader in Doha, which has been the site of years-long peace negotiations between the Afghan government and the group, said fighters on Sunday were ordered to refrain from violence and offer safe passage to those wishing to leave Kabul.
![In a nationwide offensive in the past week, the Taliban has defeated, co-opted, or sent Afghan security forces fleeing from wide swaths of the country [AFP]](https://www.aljazeera.com/wp-content/uploads/2021/08/000_9L67WR.jpg?resize=770%2C513)
It is unclear whether the government of President Ashraf Ghani will mount a counteroffensive or capitulate.
President Ghani still in Afghanistan: Source
A source close to President Ashraf Ghani has denied reports that he has fled the country, saying the president spent most of the morning in the garden of his residence in the ARG Presidential Palace with the the first lady.