the risking is sierra leo on al jazeera. we understand the differences in the cultures, the cost around what movie news and current does that matter to you? i me, us president joe biden has defended the withdrawal from his don calling the evacuation on jordan re success. let me be clear. leaving august the 31st is not due to an arbitrary deadline. it was designed to save american lives. ah.

hello money. this is out there alive from don't also coming up. the u. s. forces gone, the taliban has within to take over the gun and sounds main. airport claim. all that was left behind. huge cues outside bags and couple as oscar and desperately tried to withdraw their money. ah, and jubilant scenes in the southern city of kandahar. the place of to tell me i was not going to extend this forever war. those were the words of us president joe bought in defending his withdrawal of troops from afghanistan on his face, criticism over the chaos of the past few weeks. as i've got install rapidly fell under the control of the taliban. but bite and says,

the evacuation has been an extraordinary success. and he blamed afghan forces collapsing far more quickly than anyone expected. alan fisher, this is this report from whitehouse. my fellow americans. the war in afghanistan is now over. joe biden brought an end to america's involvement and its longest war 20 years, which still lives cost money, and damage to medic. his image in the world war to remove the taliban, which again sits in power and cabal, were left with a simple decision, either follow through the commit made by the last administration and leave afghanistan. or say we weren't levy and commit another tens of thousands more troops going back to war. that was the choice, the real choice between levy are escalating. he promised all americans who wanted to leave would be evacuated before the u. s. military where they went somewhere

between one and 200 are still they are stranded, but biting insists not forgotten. and for those remaining americans, there is no deadline. we remain committed to get them out if they want to come out . but the president pace is going criticism from political opponents and even though is on his own site, the say he fail his leadership, fail, america, fail the lives have got to stop the accountability needs to be there. but most importantly, americans need to be able to be brought home. this cannot be our history. this cannot be where this ends. we will not allow a. 6 whitening says he did the best job possible after the previous administration, never mentioning, come by name, saying to deal to pill trips out without political assurance that onto the new threat. the group behind last week, suicide attack at the international airport. there was this warning,

isis k. we are not done with you yet. here left, oregon. i think how do you know in such a short space of time was undoubtedly a military, diplomatic, and humanitarian success with americans left behind it. for very little america has questions to ask about this involvement in afghanistan. questions that are obvious and difficult. you're biting has been politically damaged by what has happened over the last few weeks. he didn't start the war, but what happened at the end? well, hang over the remainder of his time and often. allen fisher, i'll just see it up at the white house. that's bringing gabriel amazon though in washington d. c. gabriel biden. in his speech not only talked about going on, he also talks about the big picture of wanting to change us foreign policy. tell us a bit more about that. that's right. the job by has long felt that the u. s. went to afghanistan for the right reasons to go after osama bin laden,

but he's after that mission, if you will, was achieved to kill some have been lot and he just thought that the u. s. stayed in afghanistan, way too long. he did lay out, as you mentioned, a wider foreign policy perspective for the u. s. going forward visa v, the military and 2 ways. he said that any military missions by the u. s. going forward should have clear and achievable goals, something he felt for the last decade or so. the u. s. did not have enough ghana. stan, he also said that all mission's abroad for the u. s. military now should be in a fundamental interest of the u. s. and he felt that that was not necessarily the case in afghanistan for many years. he also mentioned 2 countries by name china and russia. he said those 2 countries pose in the view of a joe biden, a bigger threats in many ways to the united states. moving forward then afghan stan

is or was and he said the u. s. needs to focus on china and russia and other things by mention cyber cyber threats as well. he said, there is nothing more that china and russia would want than to see the united states bog down and africana stand for another 10 or 20 years. the big picture here is this. joe biden has always felt that he wanted to know that the u. s. should get out of afghanistan completely, when he was vice president to brock obama. he actually advised then president obama to do just that. there was one problem. joe biden then was not the president. he was the vice president and brock obama took different advice. he decided to stay in afghanistan. joe biden has always said that he would when, if he would became president, would pull all the us troops out of afghanistan. he became president. he is

president, he did just that. and based on this address to the nation, he has 0 regrets money. thanks for that. gabriel. amazon. do that for us in washington, dc. well, with foreign forces gone from afghanistan, the taliban is now looking to the future hours off to the departure of the united, the u. s. tell about meters, spoke of attracting international investment and forming and inclusive government. others surveyed what was left of america's last military installation. i'd trouble airport. charlotte bennett has this report. the roar of j t engines and the cries, the vacuum weeks, a gone. the united states biggest humanitarian, a lift is finished. foreign forces have left and the taliban is surveying territory . it hasn't howled into decor today without any doubt, was a day of f, ganeth dan's independence when we don't see a single foreign soldier and whoever invaded this country without permission,

we got rid of them. and this was a proud historical moment for us. but the celebration return fell flash cobble international when we drove from the civilian to the military side of the airport. we are very sad, believe me, after we saw the situation, we're hurt. this is where the americans vacated from last night. you can still see their planes, equipment helicopters here. the tele bond was us here. and last night they moved was one of joy celebration they were shooting in the sky. there were, there were fireworks that were very happy that the americans had left. then they saw what was left behind to save planes and helicopters after the last c, 17 transport plane took off. solomon aka was the 1st to enter the former us. the 1st thing was they were panicking in

a hurry and destroyed everything that was useful rigorously. they didn't leave us anything useful, nor did they leave any dignity or pride in themselves. the telephone, c is it won't supposed have relationship and mutual respect with the us and international community as the group seeks foreign investment. but they say this is a bad stock value. this, the national betrayal, nato said we will help you and continue our assistance. what kind of help is this? the focus now is on resourcing commercial flights. the taliban lex, the resources and technical personnel for this. so cutter and turkey helping thousands of air scans still want to leave caribou, and believe they are eligible for foreign visas. many still fearful. the taliban will run a brutal repressive regime reminiscent of the 1900 ninety's. the taliban held a news conference aimed at reassuring people. it wouldn't. that's nice to bother

this. yes, yeah. we should turn a new chapter. we should bury the hatchet. we have no animosity against any particular faction, party or individual one. we transcend above this. all. this is a close chapter of our history yet, but we are looking forward to the future with one goal in sight. i mean rebuilding our country. but this is a country with a long memory divisions and distrust run deep. the taliban admits it will take some years for its government to reach its potential. it may take many more, the afghans to heal charlotte bellis o jazeera couple. well, there been long keys outside banks in kabul, the country's long running economic problem got worse as the taliban advance, people have been trying to withdraw their maximum limit of $200.00 a day. regarding the departure of the americans, i must say that we do not want a foreign country to be on our homeland. we are happy that security is provided,

but we need bread and water. we were dependent on our salary and used to take care of our family. we even borrowed from some shop. what should people eat away when there are no salaries? i do not feel well, everyone fled and there are no work opportunities, enough gunderson at all. but when americans were here, there were many thieves, but now they have all disappeared and there is peace. meanwhile, there have been celebrations in kandahar the birthplace of the taliban and where much of its decision making is taking place. i'll just there is a ball and how the sent this update done, or should he be medina to put the hydrogen will be we after march square in the heart of kandahar south of afghanistan. as you can see, there was a march as people took to the streets, carrying taliban bennett. they are celebrating the withdrawal of all foreign forces after 20 years of occupation. facility re mood is sweeping the city and beyond the body, but not about the asthma. how did the taliban flags are also waving on shops and

residential houses as an expression of support to the movement of the 2 decades of occupation? the last american soldier left the country last night at which, with the grounds, a chanting slogan is afforded the current leader of the telephone movement. also praying for the late leader who passed away years ago. but they are also changing slogan, celebrating their freedom, the freedom they have been longing for and believed to have restored with withdrawal of the last foreign soldier. after 20 years of occupation. to lead on elders, there are $300000000.00 a day for 20 years. will look at what the us spend on is longer that he's on the water and houses torn apart the us could spend weeks picking up the pieces also hurricane ah

hello there. i'm pleased to say we got some quiet weather now coming in across the u. s. as what was, how can either continues to steadily waken. it's now a tropical depression that will waken further in the coming out. currently located around northern parts of mississippi. and it'll slide its way up. the cross tennessee into the eastern side of kentucky, pushing across west virginia and just rolling across into pennsylvania before bringing some very wet weather into new york could affect the tanis here in the middle grassy slide out across new england and into the open water for the western side of the atlantic law, she try as we go on through thursday, then heavy showers around the northern plains, down into central areas of the us, dry weather over towards the western side of the country. though we have caused the wildfire to nevada and california no sign of any rain here. plenty of rain is a central and southern parts of mexico. meanwhile,

still some very lively showers lingering on. we'll see some showers to just around the eastern side of the caribbean. on the way of the sunshine coming through for many though as we go on through the next couple of days, mostly certainly not looking too bad. a toll as far as the central america goes, some very heavy rain that just around the kirk, your costa rica, could see some very wet weather to for good part of honduras. the in countries like mine, people have been to be william, the united states have privatized the ultimate public war. this was a deal with saudi arabia. things were done differently. saudis, and other areas, when they came to britain to be all, to help the bombs deal. your from so this meeting, saddam, is it that interesting there i am. shadow on al jazeera.

ah ah, you're working out as a reminder, our top stories this our us president joe biden has defended his withdrawal of troops from afghanistan and said the evacuation. i've been a success. he criticized his creed, assessment deal with a taliban on a timeline. he said he had a few options to change ours off the us to, to tell about needed folk of to try to international investment and forming an inclusive government. but they say they're disappointed at what's been left behind them. planes and helicopters have been disabled and all that equipment destroyed. meanwhile,

they've been long keys outside bags and all the country's economic problems got worse. as the taliban people have been trying to withdraw the maximum limit of $200.00 a day. now the war in afghanistan has been expensive. president joe biden says it costs more than $300000000.00 a day. the u. s. spent more than 2 trillion dollars in its 20 years, there. more than $800000000000.00 was used to cover operational costs like weapons tanks, aircraft carriers, air strikes, military trading for guns added up to about $85000000000.00 and a campaign to deter afghans from selling heroine and opium cost over $9000000000.00 . and a further 4000000000 when to humanitarian aid. nearly $300000000000.00 was spent on services like health cast veterans, which is an expense that will continue for years to come. let's get more than this

. we can speak to retired general wesley clark, who is in little rock, arkansas. he's nato's almost supreme allied commander on a former us presidential candidate. he's now senior fellow at u. c. l. u. c. l. a's burkle center for international relations. very warm. welcome to the program. president biden today described the afghanistan evacuation as an extraordinary success. what do you make of his assessment? i think jeff president met a very strong speech. i think he cast it exactly as it should be. it was time to stop the war and do something else. we have other security issues. but also the mission of ghana was a sensually and anti terror counter. terror mission. that part of the mission was accomplished. you can't keep american troops in there in an effort to build a country for someone. the african people have to do that themselves. i think a lot of people are still struggling to understand though,

that despite the hundreds of billions of dollars we outlined some of the money spent that the us spent on afghanistan in the last $2.00 decades. this, the u. s. just hasn't made a dent on the taliban. is that something you can explain? well, i think it's very clear that the bonds a creature all boxed on. and in last, the united states was able to deal with orchestra on or physically isolate afghanistan from in grass fire lockers. donnie supported caliber forces. we weren't going to make a permanent dent in the child volume. marcus jones played a very interesting role or so there are a former us ally. we had a separation after protest on became a nuclear power, but we've done our best to work with boxed on post 911. but at the same time, august on dinner services, intelligence group was organizing funding training and guiding the towel bomb. and

there's a strategic reason for this is because boxed on is essentially a military state and is worried about a conflict with india. there was an opportunity, perhaps at one point that these pockets donnie indian issues could've been address successfully. certainly, richard holbrooke, our former ambassador man i worked with. fortunately, i believe this was possible and it was really the only way to deal successfully with down the street and what he was given the authority to do it. maybe it would have been on doable in any case, but the child on always had a secure foothold inside pocket on. and the long record of insurgent warfare shows that if you can have a secure base area, you can eventually when. and so that's essentially what apple jewel, i think sharon explanation at least partly, but the other part is africa. it's not

a nation and a conventional western since it's a collection of drives scattered over areas and people have made accommodations. some people don't like each oh, some drive don't like each other. oh, and for a long period of time there's been cordial. been pay off. all the king's was able to hold drives together with money, changing hands. now it's not dollars corruption. so a lot of people didn't like it didn't understand it. and the u. s. investment, the corruption. and so there were more reasons why the outcome was less than what was, you know, expected i guess the 3rd one in the middle region is western democracy doesn't transplants easily. she can't go into our country and 20 years change a culture by people. western democrats, one are not culturally that way. we look at our democracy in united states. we're still working on it is far from perfect. so this is the never ending problem. so

there are a lot of understand or explanation of this, but i do want to say, yes, i think the american soldiers and marines, you want terrible flyers. they did a wonderful job with in their capacity, and they should be commended. and the talib on ship also thanked the american presence. i know that's a tough lift, but the tunnel gone are taking over a country just been substantially modernized from what they gave up. 20 years ago. there are 3 mobile phone networks or television communications. rhodes, people are educated, there's functioning government. ok it's i can persuade people in regard to it. well let me pick you up on that point because the we did see in the last few days, the taliban and the americans working very well together. we had from the general yesterday who was in charge of the evacuation saying that there were very

helpful use the word helpful. does that bode well? do you think going forward? do you think the u. s. can work with the taliban in the future? possibly even to get those 100 or 200 americans that are still in afghanistan out well, you know, we just don't know how to work out. there are various elements of taliban. it's not a unified organization boss. of course, it's in their interest to portray themselves as a new different client or caliber, but underneath it all, we're still here about hitler. people are ste or frightens. they're hiding in or attics here. and they're actually in fear of death. from the caliber owner. we know that there are lots of people who are a good shot by donald on. is it personal? revenge is a tribal revenge. is it something on a ordinated hit list? we think it's more of a coordinate. it is less. is it representative or rolled down on? don't know what it's not unusual for an organization like that donavon to be able

to say one thing to the public and do something else in private. that sort of the pattern of all revolutionary movements or tell a bomb would be no different if they did that money. thanks for your time. retired general wesley clark, joining us from arkansas. thank you. thank you. let's get some of the news. syrian government forces have ramped up their offensive on a rebel enclave in the south. west of the country. fighting for the city of the raw has escalated over the past week along with the state of rebel attacks on, on the checkpoints in neighboring town. local officials, the keys president, assault forces are stopping food and medical supplies from getting in. the face. civilians have been able to leave. hurricane ida has left hundreds of thousands on the u. s. gulf coast without drinking water and electricity. they're easy, honest. davin. i called the destruction catastrophic and nighttime curfew is in

place in new orleans to stop. the crime of the city was left in darkness. and the health concerns as the region swell tis, and late summer heat, official se could take weeks to fully restore the electricity. for people have died . phil laval, reports newly in the city itself fed. okay, in times of the damage from hurricane ida when it comes to the water release. but it's when you get outside of the main city area to place it like this is la plus just north of new orleans as a city. that's where you see just the damage that was caused. the winds wrought through here, there is a huge amount of water. it was blown. we are told from a nearby lake and it is completely submerged. this area, the search and rescue operation is going on. they going taught at all. there is no way of getting down these roads. i mean, this is an actual road leads up to the freeway. so what was happening is people having to go by boat volunteers, go by boat door to door to try to reach people. now, there are

a number of dangers here. first of all, the fact that you have alligators here, perhaps not one of the obvious pages, but this is louisiana. this is marshall and you've got all of this area where you would typically have alligators living. once i mean you wouldn't tend to see them walking down main street, suburban streets, but once the bosses create these rivers, that means they've got more space to move around. and we saw at jury katrina more alligators. and we know at least one case in the last couple of days where there is been an attack, a 71 year old man, being attacked by an alligator, his wife trying to save his life. she didn't manage to it, his body has since disappeared. the other issue is disease because this water there is a current, but it is filthy and it is sitting here. lots of people who will have been hit by de bray, who would have been injured. you do not want to get this water on an open wound because the fact that you could get illness disease from this is a big problem getting to a hospital as an even bigger problem because it's very difficult to move anywhere

out of cost as the issue of power, because you can say down over here, the power lines, these will really badly had these ones still kind of standing. but there are some elsewhere that we've passed it all completely down. these are in the water now the power is off, but there are always, there's always the possibility that it could come come on intermittently, while i try to get it back up because a 1000000 also residents here and we see all without power. that's a big issue because it means that people can't keep cool. it is very hot here. they're expecting temperatures in the regions of the late thirties celsius, somewhere around about $100.00 degrees fahrenheit today. that means that people who need to keep cool cause they can't keep their food cool. people have got to keep hold of their food because there's no way of getting supplies. and this is a real issue. we are told that the search and rescue operation could go on for several days. meanwhile, they just survey the damage. we look at this, this motel. you can see the sign over there ripped away. if you go over that, zoom into the front of it, the windows completely blown out. people are trying to clean up, but they're also trying to say stay safe. and there is still no words when this

will all be over, but it's less likely to last several weeks. and out of control. wildfires continuing to spread whereas a northern california city, despite efforts of almost $4000.00 firefighters, the calendar fire threatening south lake tahoe. tens of thousands of people have been ordered to leave their homes at scorch more than 700 square kilometer met. it will get destroyed hundreds of houses or the 2005 of raging currently across california. fuel by drought and strong wind 6 members of an al qaeda linked group and bangladesh had been sentenced to death or the killings of to gay rights activists. in 2016, the matters were part of a wave of attacks targeting a says, moderates and foreigners in dhaka to other members of the unsolved as long group. what quitted by special anti terrorism tribunal? defense lawyers say they plan to appeal tolerance parliament as holding

a special session to discuss prime minister priority and tortures handling of the cove at 1900 make. the confidence debate is expected to end with a vote on start today. opposition? politicians say the country was put in a vulnerable position leading to a 3rd wave of virus debate isn't expected to appease anti government processes. protesters who've been riding since last year, scientists in south africa have detected a new career of ours parent. but they don't know yet how infectious it is. it was 1st identified in may and has now been recorded in 7 all the countries across africa, europe and asia. tests on the way to see evac. sean's will remain effective that exact right from this variance we don't really know yet we're not at the stage of fully understanding that the reason we were worried about the kind of combination

of mutations was that many of the mutations we see in, in this c dot one dot 2 are the same mutations we've seen in some other beta in self concern, particularly the the beater and the alpha and the gamma. but it's in a different combination. south sedans, new parliamentary speaker, has drawn attention to a conflict in one of its order. regents jemma new, new combat, told parliament that killings have gotten so out of hand in western equitorial, state bodies on even being buried. and she says, hundreds of homes have been bent down. the complex is between neighboring communities which support rival sides in the unity government. the leader of townsend a as main opposition party has appeared in court to face terrorism charges. the cases raising concern about the state of democracy in the country. friedman and bow away was arrested along with several other party members last month ahead of

a plan meeting to demand constitutional reforms. he's charged with terrorism financing and conspiracy. boy and his supporters have accused police of torturing him in custody to force him to make a statement in the trial. ah, this is al jazeera, these, your top stories. us president joe biden has defended his withdrawal of troops from afghanistan and said the evacuation has been a success. criticized his previous us deal with the taliban on a timeline. he said he had few options to change. we succeeded in what we set out to do and i can't stand over a decade ago. then we stayed for another decade. it was timed and this war this is a new world. the terror threat has metastasize across the world. well beyond that,

ghana stand. we face threats for males, sure. bob in somalia.