The Taliban are in control of Afghanistan and British and NATO forces will not be returning to fight the insurgents, Britain's defence minister said on Monday.

Several flight chartering companies have proposedBiman Bangladesh Airlines to evacuate thousands, including Afghan citizens who worked for the American troops, from the country in turmoil.

The United States spent more than $8 billion over 15 years on efforts to deprive the Taliban of their profits from Afghanistan's opium and heroin trade, from poppy eradication to airstrikes and raids on suspected labs.

Commercial flights from Kabul were cancelled Monday after chaotic scenes at the airport with thousands looking for a way out after the Taliban re-took power in Afghanistan.

The Taliban declared the war in Afghanistan was over after insurgents took control of the presidential palace in Kabul as US-led forces departed and Western nations scrambled on Monday to evacuate their citizens.

The Pentagon authorized another 1,000 troops to help evacuate U.S. citizens and Afghans who worked for them from Kabul, a U.S. official said on Sunday, after the embassy warned the security situation at the city's airport was changing quickly.

Afghan President Ashraf Ghani said on Sunday he left the country in order to avoid bloodshed, as the Taliban entered the presidential palace in Kabul.

Taliban insurgents entered Kabul unopposed and President Ashraf Ghani fled Afghanistan yesterday, bringing the Islamist militants close to taking over the country two decades after they were overthrown by a US-led invasion. 

Chaos erupted at Kabul airport yesterday after thousands gathered there fleeing the Taliban came under fire. 

Rescuers in northwestern China yesterday worked to free 19 trapped coal miners, hours after their site was flooded by mud in an accident that has already killed one worker.

Taliban insurgents began entering Kabul yesterday after taking control of all of Afghanistan’s major cities apart from the capital. Following are some of the major milestones in the Islamist militant movement’s advance in recent months.

The Hong Kong protest coalition that organised record-breaking democracy rallies two years ago yesterday said it was disbanding in the face of China’s sweeping clampdown on dissent in the city.

South Korea and the United States will begin their annual joint military drills today, the South’s military said yesterday, amid North Korea’s

Japan will never wage war again, Prime Minister Yoshihide Suga pledged on Sunday, as he commemorated the end of World War Two while members of his cabinet visited a shrine seen by critics as a symbol of the country’s past militarism.

Malaysia’s embattled leader will offer his resignation to the king today, a minister said, potentially spelling an end to his 17-month-old government and plunging the country into fresh turmoil.  

Two of Afghanistan’s most notorious regional warlords fled on Saturday as the northern city of Mazar-i-Sharif fell to the Taliban and security forces abandoned the city in a headlong rush up the highway to the safety of neighbouring Uzbekistan. 

The rout of Afghan forces as Taliban fighters take one provincial city after another provides a stark answer to anyone wondering about the success of two decades of US-led efforts to build a local army. 

As the Taliban stormed into Kabul today, India has put in place contingency plans to evacuate hundreds of its officials and citizens from the Afghan capital.

Afghanistan's Taliban entered the capital Kabul on Sunday and Western-backed President Ashraf Ghani left the country, with the insurgents saying they were seeking complete power.

Afghanistan President Ashraf Ghani has left the capital Kabul for Tajikistan, a senior Afghan Interior Ministry official said on Sunday, reports Reuters.