Afghan woman in limbo at Kabul airport after Taliban sweep

A young Afghan woman stands between two worlds at Kabul's airport, engulfed in panic as thousands of Afghans scramble desperate to get out following the Taliban takeover of the country

With hundreds of Afghans rushing the tarmac of Kabul’s international airport desperate to flee the return of the Taliban, a young Afghan woman stood in limbo between two worlds. In one world, Massouma Tajik would board a flight to a country she did not know, destined to become a refugee. In another, she would stay in an Afghanistan under Taliban rule, forced to wipe out the last 20 years of all that she had built and achieved. Sleepless, hungry and scared she has been waiting for hours at the airport for a flight she feared would never come with questions she could not answer. “I am in the airport, waiting to get a flight but I don’t know to where,” she said, speaking to The Associated Press over the phone. “I am here, confused, hungry and hopeless. I don’t know what is coming my way. Where will I go? How will I spend my days? Who will support my family?”