The Taliban on Saturday sealed off Kabul airport in order to prevent large crowds from leaving the war-torn country as final NATO evacuation flights left Afghanistan.
New layers of checkpoints sprang up on roads leading to the airport, some manned by uniformed Taliban fighters with Humvees and night-vision goggles captured from Afghan security forces, reported Euronews.
The massive US-led airlift wound down ahead of an August 31 deadline of the Taliban. Britain too began bringing its troops home from Afghanistan, as a Royal Air Force plane carrying soldiers landed at the RAF Brize Norton airbase northwest of London.
The troops are part of a contingent of 1,000 that has been based in Kabul to help run the airlift, reported Euronews.
The US and coalition forces have handed over the control of three gates, including the entrance to the military section, of the Kabul airport, to the Taliban, an official of the group told local media on Sunday.
"The US troops are in control of a small part of the airport, including an area where the radar system of the airport is located," Xinhua news agency quoted the official Enhamullah Samangani as saying to TOLO News.
Prime Minister Boris Johnson promised Friday to "shift heaven and earth" to get more people from Afghanistan to Britain by other means, though no concrete details have been offered.
Italy's final evacuation flight of refugees from Afghanistan also landed at Rome's Leonardo da Vinci airport. The Italian Air Force C-130J with 58 Afghan citizens aboard arrived Saturday morning, some 17 hours after it departed from the Kabul airport and after a planned stopover, reported Euronews.
Meanwhile, US President Joe Biden on Saturday (local time) warned that another terror attack at Kabul airport is "highly likely in the next 24-36 hours".
"The situation on the ground continues to be extremely dangerous, and the threat of terrorist attacks on the airport remains high. Our commanders informed me that an attack is highly likely in the next 24-36 hours," Biden said in a statement.
The remarks come after a suicide bomber and multiple ISIS-K gunmen killed 13 US service members and at least 169 Afghan civilians in the attack at Hamid Karzai International Airport on Thursday.
The US Embassy in Afghanistan also urged Americans to leave the Kabul airport area because of a specific threat in Afghanistan.
"Due to a specific, credible threat, all U.S. citizens in the vicinity of Kabul airport (HKIA), including the South (Airport Circle) gate, the new Ministry of the Interior, and the gate near the Panjshir Petrol station on the northwest side of the airport should leave the airport area immediately," the embassy said in a security alert on Saturday (local time).
The takeover came after a deadly suicide bomb blast and gun firing claimed by IS-K, a local affiliate of the Islamic State terror greoup, killed 170 Afghans and 13 US troops at an eastern gate of the facility on August 26.
Earlier a Taliban official reportedly said that the group's special forces, and a team of technical professionals and qualified engineers were ready to take over all charges of the airport after the departure of the US forces.
Dozens of planes, including military planes, took off from the airport since late Saturday.
Most of some 6,000 US and coalition forces and a unit of Afghan Special Forces who were deployed to the airport before the Taliban's takeover of Kabul on August 15 had reportedly evacuated.
All US and coalition forces are expected to leave the country on August 31, a planned deadline set by President Joe Biden.
