EU foreign chief calls fall of Kabul "catastrophe"

The European Union’s foreign policy chief has called the fall of Afghanistan’s capital and the resurgence of the Taliban “a catastrophe” and “nightmare” that laid bare a failure of intelligence and trans-Atlantic cooperation

BRUSSELS -- The European Union's foreign policy chief on Thursday called the fall of Afghanistan's capital and the resurgence of the Taliban “a catastrophe” and “nightmare” that laid bare a failure of intelligence and trans-Atlantic cooperation. EU foreign affairs chief Josep Borrell further criticized U.S. President Joe Biden for underplaying the commitment to nation-building in Afghanistan. Borrell insisted that instilling the rule of law and achieving basic rights for women and minorities were goals of the Western military intervention in the country, along with the initial goal of stamping out terrorism emanating from the region. “President Biden said the other day that it has never been the purpose, state building was not the purpose. Well, this is arguable,” Borrell told a European Parliament committee. “Twenty years on, you can say that we may have succeeded in the first tack of our mission, but failed in the second,” the Spanish politician said as EU lawmakers heaped on criticism of the West's lack of commitment to Afghanistan.