NATO allies struggle to keep Kabul airport open for aid after withdrawal

According to REUTERS, NATO allies are struggling to ensure that Afghanistan's main gateway, Kabul airport, remains open for urgently needed humanitarian aid flights next week when they end their evacuation airlifts and turn it over to the Taliban.

The airport, a lifeline for tens of thousands of evacuees fleeing Taliban fighters in the past two weeks and for aid arriving to relieve the impact of drought and conflict, was hit by a deadly suicide bombing outside its gates on Thursday.

Turkey said it was still talking to the Taliban about providing technical help to operate the airport after the Aug. 31 deadline for troops to leave Afghanistan but said the bombing underlined the need for a Turkish force to protect any experts deployed there.

Turkey has not said whether the Taliban would accept such a condition, and President Tayyip Erdogan said on Friday his country was "not in a rush to start flights" again to Kabul.

But aid groups said there is an urgent need to maintain humanitarian deliveries to a country suffering its second drought in four years and where 18 million people, nearly half the population, depend on life-saving assistance.

U.S. State Department spokesman Ned Price said on Friday that U.S. and allied air traffic experts had assessed Kabul airport "for capabilities that would support the resumption of commercial operations once we depart" and that the United States was working with all parties "to facilitate a smooth transfer."

However, he noted: "With the U.S. military set to depart by Aug. 31, I think that it is probably unreasonable to expect that there will be normal airport operations on Sept. 1."

Price said the Taliban also wanted a functioning airport and stressed that the operation of the airport after Aug. 31 was "not up to us". The Pentagon said several nations are willing to work with the Taliban to keep the airport operating.

The World Food Programme, which runs the U.N. Humanitarian Air Service, is planning to start flights over the weekend to create a humanitarian air bridge into Afghanistan, U.N. spokesman Stephane Dujarric told reporters in New York.