Afghanistan updates
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Boris Johnson faced a furious House of Commons on Wednesday as the prime minister was sharply criticised by MPs from all parties, including several former soldiers, over the UK’s response to the Afghanistan crisis.
Parliamentarians briefly returned from their summer recess for a debate on the Taliban’s rapid takeover. Speaking to a packed chamber — the first sitting without social distancing since March 2020 — Johnson said “the sacrifice in Afghanistan is seared into our national consciousness”.
“The events in Afghanistan have unfolded and the collapse has been faster than even the Taliban themselves predicted,” he said. “What is not true is to say the UK government was unprepared or did not foresee this: it was certainly part of our planning.”
Theresa May, the former prime minister, was one of several Conservative MPs to criticise the Johnson government. She questioned why it had been caught off guard by the Taliban’s rapid gains.
“Was our…
