Taliban controls two-thirds of Afghan-Tajik border: Russia

Taliban spokesman Zabihullah Mujahid said on Friday that its forces have captured a key border crossing with Turkmenistan.

"The important Torghundi border port has been fully captured," Zabihullah said even as the Afghan government added that its forces are trying to recapture the area.

Watch:

The Taliban has made rapid gains through the northern areas which wasn't their original stronghold as it informed that it now controls over 85 per cent of territory in the country.

"We want all parts of the Afghan society without depending on their size and ethnicity to take part in Afghanistan state-building," Taliban's official spokesman Shahabuddin Delawar said.

"All the ports taken under control by the Islamic Emirate of Afghanistan will continue their operation in the normal regime," Delawar added.

The Taliban said it will not allow the country "to be used by any third party again," while asserting that it will ensure Islamic State will also never "act on the Afghanistan territory.”

Meanwhile, Russia's foreign ministry spokesperson Maria Zakharova said: "The Taliban movement in a short time took control of the big part of the border districts. At the moment, they control about two-thirds of the Afghan-Tajik border."

US President Joe Biden had declared on Thursday that American troops will pull out on August 31 from Afghanistan.

President Joe Biden speaking on troop withdrawal said that the Taliban's takeover of the country was not inevitable, adding, "I will not send another generation of Americans to war in Afghanistan with no reasonable expectation of achieving a different outcome."

"There's going to be no circumstance you're going to see people being lifted off the roof of an embassy in the -- of the United States from Afghanistan. It is not at all comparable," the US President said.

Last week the Taliban had overrun several posts close to Tajikistan, China and Pakistan border areas as it captured a key district in western Afghanistan including a major border crossing with Iran.

(With inputs from Agencies)