Afghan embassy in India slams president Ashraf Ghani, official says Twitter account hacked

Several tweets on the handle of the Afghan embassy in India were deleted after they berated Afghanistan President Ashraf Ghani for escaping the country as the Taliban took over the country.

Abdulhaq Azad, the press secretary of the Afghan embassy in India, later said he does not have access to the account and that it has been hacked. “I have lost access to the Twitter handle of Afghan Embassy India, a friend sent a screenshot of this tweet, (this tweet is hidden from me.) I have tried to log in but can’t access it. Seems it is hacked,” Azad tweeted on Monday morning.

Screenshots of the now-deleted tweets are being widely shared by Twitter users.

Abdullah Abdullah, the head of the Afghan National Reconciliation Council, accused Ghani of “leaving the people to this situation”. “The former president of Afghanistan left Afghanistan, leaving the country in this difficult situation,” Abdullah said. “God should hold him accountable.”

Social media users called Ghani, who did not disclose his location, a “coward” for leaving his fellow country people in chaos. Tolo News suggested Ghani fled to Tajikistan.

Ghani later posted on Facebook that he had chosen to leave the country to avert bloodshed in Kabul overtaken by the Taliban. Ghani said he had left the country to avoid clashes with the Taliban and that “countless patriots would be martyred and the city of Kabul would be destroyed” if he had stayed behind. “The Taliban have won with the judgement of their swords and guns, and are now responsible for the honour, property and self-preservation of their countrymen,” he said in a statement posted to Facebook.

“They are now facing a new historical test. Either they will preserve the name and honour of Afghanistan or they will give priority to other places and networks,” he added.

Countries, including the US and the UK, rushed to airlift diplomats, other personnel and citizens from Kabul as the Taliban seized Kabul in a stunningly swift offensive. The United States even sent thousands of fresh troops back into Afghanistan. On Monday, US state department spokesperson Ned Price announced the US had completed the evacuation of its embassy in Afghanistan and lowered the American flag.

Thousands of Afghan families crowded the Kabul airport in a desperate bid to escape the Taliban.