US defence secretary Lloyd Austin says Americans ‘beaten’ by Taliban: Report

US defence secretary Lloyd Austin offered a disconcerting news on Friday when he told a group of lawmakers during a briefing that Americans are among those who have been beaten by the Taliban at airport checkpoints.

The news came on a day when President Joe Biden said he is not aware of American citizens facing difficulties getting through Taliban checkpoints.

Pentagon leaders had earlier said that the scenes unfolding in Afghanistan, as citizens frantically tried to get out of the country and escape the new Taliban rule, were tough for them to watch.

Austin told the House members that Americans have been “harassed and beaten” by the Taliban while trying to escape from Afghanistan, Politico reported quoting people aware of the developments of the briefing call. He further said that this is “unacceptable”, Politico further reported.

There are currently about 5,800 US troops at the airport in Kabul to help with evacuation efforts, an American official said on Friday. Austin has ordered about 6,000 troops to Kabul, a number that is expected to be reached in the coming days, according to the official.

The US is trying hard to speed up the process of evacuation. With the August 31 deadline looming, tens of thousands still remained to be airlifted from the war-torn country. The United States is also evacuating Afghans who helped its troops during their two-decade-long stay in the country.

“We have a moral obligation to help those who helped us. And I feel the urgency deeply,” Austin said on Friday.

About 2,000 passengers were flown out on each of the past two days, Pentagon spokesman John Kirby said.

He added that the military has aircraft available to evacuate 5,000 to 9,000 people per day, but until Thursday far fewer designated evacuees had been able to reach, and then enter, the airport.