The latest on Afghanistan as the Taliban take charge

The "Taliban are intensifying the hunt-down of all individuals and collaborators with the former regime," according to a threat assessment report prepared for the UN by a Norwegian organization.

The Norwegian Center for Global Analyses report, published on August 18 said:

CNN has obtained a copy of the brief report which details mounting concerns for the former regime's partners. It said:

The report also includes a document that appears to be written by the Taliban's Military Commission to a senior security official in the former government who, it said, had "excellent relations with the Americans and the British."

The alleged Taliban document, dated August 16, said the senior security official in the former government must report to the Taliban's Military Commission. Failure to do so would mean that "your family members will be arrested instead, and you are responsible for this," the document said.

CNN has been unable to independently establish the extent of the Taliban's search for members of the former government's security services, nor how many may have been arrested. 

Since the Taliban swept to power in Afghanistan, it's been difficult to get a picture of what life is like for Afghan women outside the capital, Kabul.

Three women — all in their mid-20s and well educated — gave CNN a glimpse of how their lives have been affected by the swift regime change.

CNN is not using their names, for their own security.

"No one trusts anything that comes from the Taliban's mouth."

One woman, originally from the northern city of Kunduz, has been sheltering in Kabul with her family ever since a rocket hit their home.

"Women are not leaving their homes; everyone is staying put at home," she said of people she is still in touch with from Kunduz.

"The people here have lost their peace of mind."

Another interviewee, who is still in Kunduz, told CNN she is stressed about meeting basic survival needs, like food and water. She described the city as quiet, but tense.

For her, one incident encapsulates the seismic change in Afghanistan.

"The other day, one of our female teachers went back to school and hopped on a rickshaw to get there ... However, the Taliban stopped them and beat up the driver for transporting her without a male chaperone," she said.

"Everyone is waiting to see."

A woman in the city of Herat described the shock that has gripped the city along with questions on what the Taliban's laws and rules will look like.

"Women are stressed and are asking the question: Will we really go back to the '90s after 20 years of so much hard work and progress?" she asked.

"Though men don't feel the same personal level of anxiety as women, they are worried ... for the future of their wives and children, especially those who have young daughters," she said.

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The Taliban has killed a family member of a journalist for Deutsche Welle, the German international broadcaster said.

In an article published on Thursday, DW said that Taliban fighters had been searching for one of their journalists in Afghanistan, and confirmed that a relative of the journalist was shot dead by the Taliban on Wednesday with one other person seriously injured. Other relatives were able to escape at the last minute and are on the run, the DW article said. 

The article added that the homes of at least three DW journalists had been searched by the Taliban. 

DW's press spokesman Christoph Jumpelt told CNN in a written statement that ''at this point we are not giving individual statements pertaining to the tragic event concerning the relatives of one of our journalists.''

On Sunday -- the day Kabul fell to the Taliban -- DW and other major German news media urged the German government to help evacuate their Afghan staff to Germany. 

In an open letter to German Chancellor Angela Merkel and Foreign Minister Heiko Maas, German major newspapers as well as public and commercial broadcasters including DW and the DPA news agency requested a speedy evacuation of their Afghan journalists whose lives were in danger. They also called for an emergency visa program to allow their employees to emigrate to Germany. 

The signatories of the letter warned that "the lives of these freelance staff are now in acute danger.''

''Even life in Kabul has become extremely risky for employees of international media organizations. Following the withdrawal of international troops, including German troops, there are growing concerns that the Taliban will take revenge against our employees," the letter said.

The letter added that dozens of journalists have been murdered in recent years, by the Taliban, by the "Islamic State," or by unknown persons -- and almost never has the government identified the perpetrators.

"It must be feared that such murders will now dramatically increase — and many of our staff are at risk. Employees who want to leave the country face persecution, arrest, torture and death. We, therefore, ask you to act quickly," the letter's signatories pleaded. 

German Chancellor Angela Merkel has described the Taliban's takeover of Afghanistan as “bitter, dramatic and terrible,” and stressed the importance of evacuating as many Afghans as possible, who supported the German military and civilian efforts in the country.

Germany’s 11th military evacuation flight departed Kabul Friday morning with 181 people on board, bringing the total number of evacuees to 1,640, said the country's Defense Ministry.

The Airbus A400M military transport aircraft, belonging to the German Armed Forces, landed in the Uzbekistan capital of Tashkent with the 181 on board, said the ministry.

Germany has been operating a shuttle service between Tashkent and Kabul several times a day as part of its evacuation efforts.

In an earlier tweet, German Foreign Minister Heiko Maas said, ''Germany is providing 100 million euros in emergency aid for refugees from Afghanistan.'' The funds aim to support international aid organizations that are helping people in neighboring countries, he said.

Germany has started relocating people from Afghanistan who have arrived in Frankfurt. The country's Federal Office for Migration and Refugees confirmed to CNN Friday morning that around 60 Afghans, including three children, have arrived in Doberlug-Kirchhain, the federal state of Brandenburg close to Berlin.

'We have to expect that these people may be traumatized -- some of them severely," Martin Burmeister, spokesperson at the Interior Ministry in Brandenburg, told CNN.

The evacuees are set to stay in Doberlug-Kirchhain until Tuesday, Burmeister said, where they will be tested for the coronavirus, given a hygiene package, medical assistance and if needed clothing, before they are moved to other locations. 

M.A., a photojournalist in Kabul, has locked herself at home since the Taliban took the capital. "I may be in danger just because of who I am," she said. "If you, as a woman, take photos, it's forbidden."

But she has continued taking photos of life in Taliban-occupied Kabul even while in hiding, capturing snapshots out her window and when she occasionally ventures outside.

CNN is identifying M.A. by her initials for her safety.

Her photos show military vehicles and armed men on the street, as well as crowds of people -- including women and children -- near the airport, where people have been unable to enter due to Taliban fighters stationed outside.

She and other women are now living in fear, dreading the loss of rights that they had worked hard to gain over the past 20 years.

"Most women here that used to work in offices, in the government offices, on social media they are all worrying about the situation," she said. "They all say that they didn’t think they would have to deal with this anymore."

Though the Taliban have promised to be more inclusive and allow women to go to school, M.A. says she and others have little faith in that assurance, after still-fresh memories of their oppressive regime between 1996 and 2001.

There is widespread anger among her friends and colleagues over the US withdrawal, and a sense that they have been abandoned, she said. "How is it possible that the US comes to my country and starts to fight with the Taliban and kicks them out of my country -- and now they just leave us and it creates a situation that is so unbelievable?" she said.

And across the city, people are desperate to flee. M.A. tried to go to the airport with her mother and brother, who has a mental illness and is married with two children -- but they weren't able to get out.

Earlier in the week, videos and photos went viral showing desperate people clinging to US evacuation planes as they took off and falling to their deaths. The horrific images "tell me how tired of war my people are," M.A. said. "The young generation want to just go somewhere better than this country, they don’t see a future for themselves here in this country.” 

The US Air Force evacuated approximately 3,000 people from Kabul's Hamid Karzai International Airport on Thursday, according to a White House official.

Nearly 350 US citizens were among the evacuees, the official said, with the others being family members of US citizens, Special Immigrant Visa applicants and their families and other vulnerable Afghans.

The 3,000 people were carried on 16 flights by Air Force C-17 transports.

Another 11 civilian charter flights departed the Kabul airport in the past 24 hours. The number of people on those flights was not disclosed.

India’s Foreign Minister S Jaishankar has expressed concerns over terrorism for the first time since the Taliban overthrew the US-backed government in Afghanistan.  

“The international community holds a collective view that terrorism in all its forms and manifestations must be condemned. There cannot be any exception or any justification for any act of terrorism, regardless of motivations behind such acts,” Jaishankar said in an address to the United Nations Security Council in New York on Thursday. 

“However, in spite of the progress we have made to tighten the legal, security, financing and other frameworks to combat terrorism, terrorists are constantly finding newer ways of motivating, resourcing and executing acts of terror,” he continued.

In comments appeared to be directed towards neighboring Pakistan, he pointed out that some countries “seek to undermine or subvert our collective resolve to fight terrorism," adding that it “cannot be allowed to pass.”

In a statement on Thursday, UNESCO urged authorities in Afghanistan to preserve the country's "cultural heritage in its diversity, in full respect of international law, and (take) all necessary precautions to spare and protect cultural heritage from damage and looting."

The France-based body, which bestows the ranking of "World Heritage Site" on historic or important places around the world, said it was closely monitoring the situation in Afghanistan and was "committed to exercising all possible efforts to safeguard the invaluable cultural heritage of Afghanistan."

There are a number of UNESCO World Heritage Sites in the country, including the Minaret and Archaeological Remains of Jam, and the archaeological remains of the Bamiyan Valley. Other important sites "that must be safeguarded" include the Old City of Herat and the National Museum in Kabul, said UNESCO.

A group of US diplomats wrote a classified cable to Secretary of State Antony Blinken in mid-July, warning that swift action needed to be taken because they believed the situation in Afghanistan could rapidly deteriorate and they feared a catastrophe.

They laid out how the department should act quickly to process and evacuate Afghans who had assisted the United States and get them out of the country quickly. 

The diplomats decided to send the dissent memo because they felt previous warnings and recommendations they had made were being ignored and labeled alarmist, two State Department officials told CNN.

The classified cable, signed by more than a dozen US diplomats, urged specific steps to be taken, including starting a biometric enrolment program for the Afghans applying for Special Immigrant Visas (SIV) or refugee status ahead of the evacuation, so they wouldn't waste time before what they believed would be the imminent collapse of the Afghan government as the US withdrew.

The State Department responded to the cable within days of receiving it and followed through on some of the issues it raised, said a source familiar with the matter. But not all of the recommendations in the memo were quickly implemented, the diplomats said.

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