Dominic Raab shuts down claims UK is to blame for Kabul deaths
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Dominic Raab has rebuked Pentagon claims that the UK is to blame for the high death toll as a result of the suicide bombings in Kabul last week. Pentagon leaks claimed that the US had kept open a gate at the airport to assist the British to evacuate, resulting in easier access for the suicide bomber.
Speaking on BBC Breakfast, Dan Walker asked the Foreign Secretary: “It’s been reported the Pentagon are blaming the UK for a high death toll when that explosion we saw at the airport last week during the evacuation.
Mr Raab replied: “No and look I’ve got an excellent working relationship with Tony Blinken, the Secretary of State.
“I’ve spoken to him in the immediate hours after the attack and again yesterday.
“We also shifted the civilian team that we had in the Barons hotel to the airport because it clearly a stone’s throw away from where the terrorist attack took place.
“It clearly wasn’t safe.”
According to leaked claims from the Pentagon, American forces decided to keep the gate open longer than they wanted to allow British officials to continue evacuating personnel.
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ISIS-K carried out the attack on Kabul airport on Thursday, killing two Britons and the child of a British national, along with 13 US service personnel and dozens of Afghans.
Former Tory leader Sir Iain Duncan Smith has blamed the US and President Joe Biden for the terror attack at Kabul airport on August 26.
Speaking to LBC, he said: “President Biden was responsible for those decisions which, I believe, were critical in the course of the events that we’ve seen unfold.
“I do think now to attempt to try and brief against the UK on the suicide bombing is reprehensible really, because, you know, if the American government or the American military were very serious about shutting the gates, they would have shut the gates.
“I think this idea that it was down to the idea that the British were begging them to keep them open, I think is a little bit mean-spirited on them and probably wrong.”
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