matthieu: thank you, amy.13 years i have been working here i have never seen the situation as grim. kabul has been quiet the last few months. that was shatted with this massive suicide attack. the provinces are falling to the taliban. there are a number of provincial capitals encircled. this afternoon we had news that the taliban have taken over the capital of nimros province, a strategic province because of the borders with iran and pakistan. we are seeing images of that no it is the first time they have seen the provincial cital since the fall of two induce -- kunduz in 2015 when they took it back with the help of the u.s. the bad news seems to continue. amy: can you talabout who the taliban are? matthieu: the taliban are a rurally-based insurgency. at this point they are setting up an ternative government in their territories. they want to establish an islamic system, an islamic emirate. they claim to be fighting to remove foreign occupation. they call themselves the majahad een, the same fighters against t

matthieu, what is the mood on the street? are people going about their business and are people out there watching what is going on and have you seen any taliban within kabul? >> i have not seen any taliban forces within kabul. there are, i think some that are coming in and actually arranging for certain to surrender. there haven't been any groups of taliban that i've seen here. all of the shops are closed for the most hopart. people shuttered down and gone home and streets are fairly empty of traffic, except for taxies. you see taxies stopped and groups of soldiers and former soldiers and former police negotiating and get out. >> what does getting out mean, by the way? sort of four main roads in different directions, you know, almost out of kabul and the taliban controlled most of them. short of getting to the airport, where do people go if they don't want to be in kabul and, frankly, is it better anywhere else? >> well, from what i understand there's whactually civilian traffic that has been flowing across the front lines. s