Afghanistan crisis live updates: India allowed to operate two flights daily to evacuate citizens from Kabul

The Taliban aim to unveil a new governing framework for Afghanistan in the next few weeks, a spokesman for the Islamist movement said on Saturday, after the insurgents' swift takeover of the South Asian nation. "Legal, religious and foreign policy experts in the Taliban aim to present the new governing framework in the next few weeks," the official told Reuters.

As the situation in Afghanistan remains uncertain following the Taliban's swift takeover of most parts of the country on August 15, the international community has warned against potential humanitarian challenges and expressed a willingness to help the country establish peace and stability. In a phone conversation with the UK's First Secretary of State and Foreign Secretary Dominic Raab on Thursday, Chinese State Councillor and Foreign Minister Wang Yi said that after more than 40 years of war, the Afghan people yearn for stability and do not want another war or more chaos, reports Xinhua news agency.

Indonesia has moved its Afghanistan diplomatic mission from Kabul to Pakistan, its foreign minister said on Saturday, after its air force evacuated dozens in the wake of the Taliban's seizure of power. "Temporarily, the diplomatic mission in Kabul will be done from Islamabad," Retno Marsudi said in televised remarks at the Halim military airport in Jakarta.

UNHCR, has expressed concern about the prevailing humanitarian needs within Afghanistan and urged for continuous support to ensure necessary assistance in the country. In a statement issued on Friday, the UN agency said the situation on the ground across the country remains extremely fluid."Bolstered support for the humanitarian response inside Afghanistan itself is urgently needed to deliver assistance to the Afghan people, including some half a million displaced this year alone. The vast majority of Afghans are not able to leave the country through regular channels. The footage taken a few days ago of crowds at the airport has shocked the world, speaking powerfully to the sense of fear and uncertainty among many Afghans," the UN refugee agency said.

Terrified that the new rulers would commit such abuses and despairing for their country's future, thousands have raced to Kabul's airport, where chaotic scenes continued unabated. People seeking to escape struggled to get past crushing crowds, Taliban airport checkpoints and US bureaucracy. Video images showed crowds gathered in the dark outside the barbed-wire topped walls. Occasionally someone shot a stream of gunfire into the air.

Prime Minister Boris Johnson said on Friday Britain would work with the Taliban if necessary after the militants capture of Afghanistan, and defended his foreign minister who has come under fire for his handling of the situation. "What I want to assure people is that our political and diplomatic efforts to find a solution for Afghanistan, working with the Taliban, of course if necessary, will go on," Johnson told media.

“We made clear to the Taliban that any attack, any attack on our forces or disruption of our operations at the airport will be met with a swift and forceful response, "Biden told reporters at a White House news conference. "We're also keeping a close watch on any potential terrorist threat at or around the airport, including from the ISIS affiliates in Afghanistan," he said.

Taliban websites that delivered the victorious insurgents' official messages to Afghans and the world at large in five languages went offline abruptly Friday, indicating an effort to try to squelch them. It is not immediately clear, though, why the sites in the Pashto, Urdu, Arabic, English and Dari languages went offline Friday. They had been shielded by Cloudflare, a San Francisco-based content delivery network and denial-of-service protection provider.

The strategic partnership between India and the United States is more critical than ever in containing the Taliban and preventing terrorism, an influential American lawmaker said Friday."The US-India strategic partnership is now even more critical in containing the Taliban and preventing terrorism," Indian American Congressman Ro Khanna said in a tweet.

China is tightening control over information gathered by companies about the public under a law approved on Friday, expanding the ruling Communist Party’s crackdown on internet industries. The law would impose some of the world’s strictest controls on private sector handling of information about individuals.

As the Taliban cement their control over Afghanistan, there is a deepening fear among the country’s religious and ethnic minorities that the gains they made over the past two decades could be lost and that they could again find themselves the target of persecution. Many Hazaras worry that atrocities of the past will be revisited despite assurances from the Taliban leadership that they have changed. “We are extremely worried and scared. Taliban have a history of violence against us,” one Hazara man who lives in Kabul said by telephone, not wanting his name used in public for fear of reprisals

Facebook says it has added several security features to help people in Afghanistan control their accounts as fears rise of reprisals from the Taliban. In a series of tweets late Thursday, Facebook’s head of security said the firm had temporarily disabled the ability to view and search the friends lists of Facebook accounts inside Afghanistan.