US helped 4 US citizens leave Afghanistan overland, official says
By
Alex Marquardt,
Chandelis Duster and
Brianna Keilar, CNN
Updated 10:14 PM ET, Mon September 6, 2021
(CNN)The United States facilitated the departure of four American citizens from Afghanistan via an overland route to a third country, a senior State Department official said Monday.
"Our Embassy greeted the Americans as they crossed the border into the third country," the official told CNN.
The official confirmed that these are the first four Americans that "we've facilitated in this manner" since the withdrawal of US troops from Afghanistan. They are a woman and her three children from Amarillo, Texas, according to Rep. Markwayne Mullin, an Oklahoma Republican, who has been assisting an American non profit-funded group of former special forces, military, contractors and others who are working to get Americans and Special Immigrant Visa holders out of Afghanistan. Mullin told CNN he had spoken with the woman multiple times Monday, including before and after she had exited Afghanistan. Mullin described the harrowing journey she and her children made on the roads from Kabul to a border crossing, which requires them to pass through more than 20 Taliban checkpoints. She and her family had been unable to get through a gate at Hamid Karzai International Airport in Kabul while the US military was still evacuating people from the capital.They then attempted an escape by airplane from another city in Afghanistan but were unsuccessful.
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Mullin said the family had spent 13 hours with the
Taliban at a checkpoint near the border, unable to secure passage from the group one day before they were ultimately successful. He says they were ready to give up and return to Kabul but their American contacts urged them to persist.
The non-profit-funded group he has been assisting alerted the State Department to the presence of the American citizens, according to Mullin.
Reporters traveling with Secretary of State Tony Blinken were told Monday that the Americans "were in good condition" and that the Taliban were aware of their departure and did not impede it.
A State Department official would not confirm specifics of the departure, referring to an earlier statement that CNN reported.
"In order to protect their privacy and preserve the viability of our tactics, we're not in a position to offer additional information," the official told CNN.
The Taliban have given assurances that foreigners and Afghans with the appropriate travel documents will be allowed to leave the country.
News of the departure comes nearly a week after the last
US troops departed Afghanistan to meet an August 31 deadline and as the Biden administration faces pressure to help the remaining Americans and Afghan allies who helped the US leave the country.
