Taliban fighters victoriously walk into Kabul Airport premises

Hours after the last foreign forces withdrew from Afghanistan, Taliban leaders walked victorious through the Kabul airport, flanked by guards dressed in special forces combat kit inspecting destroyed US military equipment.

Taliban spokesman Zabihullah Mujahid led a group of officials onto the runway, a broad grin on his usually stoic face.

“Congratulations to Afghanistan… this victory belongs to us all,” Mujahid told reporters. “America was defeated, they could not achieve their targets through military operations,” he said.

The Taliban’s “Badri 313” special forces unit posed for pictures, brandishing US rifles and flying the group’s white flag.

Once one of the most secure sites in Afghanistan, the airport’s passenger terminal was left in chaos with empty bullet casings littering the floor near all the entrances.

The airport was at the centre of a chaotic evacuation since the Taliban took over the country on August 15. The US and its allies airlifted more than 100,000 people, both foreigners and Afghans who feared reprisals from the new rulers.