The frantic calls began the night before the city fell. “We are hearing the Taliban are at the gates of Kabul,” said one. “Please, help get us out,” said another. Whether by phone, WhatsApp or Signal, a career’s worth of contacts were suddenly reaching out to me, desperate for escape.
For as long as I had known Kabul, fear had never been far from the place. It was a city whose people quietly understood that at any moment, the routines of daily life could be shattered by some grotesque act of violence. This was usually a faint feeling – discomforting yet tolerable. Now it had congealed into something else. This was terror.
Subscribe to The New Statesman today from only £8.99 per month
Content from our partners
