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'Chaotic' and slow British response left thousands of Afghans unable to flee the Taliban, whistleblower claims
CNN
Thousands of desperate Afghans were unable to flee the Taliban following the fall of Kabul because the British government's response to the crisis was disorganized and slow, a whistleblower has claimed.
Britain's then-Foreign Secretary Dominic Raab took several hours to respond to urgent requests, while Prime Minister Boris Johnson insisted vital resources were used to evacuate animals instead of people, an ex-staffer at the UK's Foreign Office alleged in written testimony to Parliament published on Tuesday.
His damning account paints a picture of dysfunction at the heart of Britain's government during one of the West's most urgent crises in recent times, and suggests that the department's bureaucratic complacency may have had fatal consequences.
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The retired Air Force general announced as the next chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff by President Donald Trump after the abrupt Friday night firing of his predecessor is a respected career F-16 pilot who is described by current and former officials who served with him as a professional with a “strong moral center.”
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Over the past 10 days, Vice President JD Vance put Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky on notice, rattled the confidence of century-old allies in Western Europe during his first foreign trip, decamped to Capitol Hill to help in delicate budget talks and delivered a spirited defense of the Trump administration’s first month to a gathering of conservatives outside the nation’s capital.