A senior Taliban official has declared victory in Afghanistan, praising the "unrivalled feat" of taking the capital Kabul and ousting the president
Taliban fighters are pictured inside Kabul's presidential palace
Mullah Baradar said in a video statement on Sunday that the militants' road to power was unexpectedly fast, but the "war in Afghanistan is over now".
He told Al Jazeera the "type of regime" the Taliban plans to introduce "will become clear soon", but they will guarantee the safety of all citizens and officials.
Taliban spokesman Suhail Shaheen told the Associated Press that they are holding talks to form an "open, inclusive Islamic government".
It comes after the group captured the presidential palace and 11 districts of Kabul, causing President Ashraf Ghani to flee "bloodshed".
British troops arrived in the city to help evacuate UK nationals over the weekend, as the Pentagon ordered a further 1,000 US personnel and countries across the globe scrambled to get their diplomats out of the country safely.
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| A Taliban spokesman said the nature of its rule will 'become clear soon |
Earlier on Sunday Reuters reported Mr Ghani's departure Tajikistan, citing a senior interior ministry official.
But in a later Facebook post, the president said he was faced with a "hard choice" between the "armed Taliban" or "leaving the dear country that I dedicated my life to protecting the past 20 years".
"If left unchecked, countless patriots would be martyred and the city of Kabul would be devastated, resulting in a major humanitarian catastrophe in the six-million-strong city," he said.
"The Taliban had made it clear that they were ready to carry out a bloody attack on all of Kabul and the people of Kabul to oust me. In order to prevent a flood of bloodshed, I decided to leave."
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| Taliban fighters are pictured in Ghazni, southeastern Afghanistan as they raise their flag |
He added that the militants had "won victory in a judgment of sword and gun" and they "have a responsibility to protect the honour, prosperity and self-respect of our compatriots".
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| Afghan President Ashraf Ghani is pictured speaking inside parliament in Kabul |
It came amid reports of several explosions in city, despite the Taliban saying that they wanted a "peaceful transition of power".
Prime Minister Boris Johnson chaired a COBRA meeting on the Afghan crisis this evening after requesting to recall parliament from its summer break on Wednesday.
He said the UK and its international partners should work to ensure "Afghanistan does not become a breeding ground for terror" once again.
Mr Johnson added that the "situation remains difficult" and the world is facing a "change of regime in Kabul".
As British troops from the 16 Air Assault Brigade landed on Sunday, British Airways and Virgin Atlantic ordered its pilots to stay away from Afghan airspace over security concerns.
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| Women on the streets of Kabul over the weekend |
Mr Johnson said the government is trying to get as many British nationals out of the country as it can "in the next few days".
A Foreign Office spokesperson added that the UK had "reduced" its diplomatic presence in Afghanistan, "but our ambassador remains in Kabul and UK government staff continue to work to provide assistance to British nationals and to our Afghan staff".
According to The Sunday Telegraph, Britain's ambassador to Afghanistan Sir Laurie Bristow is going to be flown out of the country by tonight.
The Taliban has made rapid gains over the past week, with Western countries urgently deploying troops to assist with the evacuation of diplomatic staff.
Meanwhile, crowds of people were seen at the border gate to Pakistan in an attempt to leave the country over the weekend, as militants drove through the streets of Kabul.
The Islamists have said there will be no fighting in the city and anyone who wants to leave should be able to do so peacefully, with women told to head for protected areas.
But President Ghani's comments on Sunday painted a very different picture, with international observers fearing the worst.
The UN Security Council said it would hold an emergency meeting on Monday morning, with secretary-general Antonio Guterres urging the Taliban to "exercise utmost restraint in order to protect lives".
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| Afghans walk towards the border with Pakistan in a bid to escape the crisis |
US President Joe Biden announced he was sending 6,000 troops to Kabul to help remove personnel - and the evacuation of the American embassy has now begun.
US diplomats have been urgently destroying sensitive documents, with helicopters seen flying over the US embassy.
The Biden administration has warned Taliban officials any actions that put American personnel at risk "will be met with a swift and strong US military response".
The president has defended his decision to withdraw US troops from the country in the coming weeks, and said the task of fighting back against Taliban insurgents must fall to Afghan forces.
He warned that an indefinite American military presence in Afghanistan is not an option, and has vowed not to pass on the war to a fifth US president.
But the handling of the crisis has attracted criticism from some American politicians, with his predecessor Donald Trump claiming that Mr Biden "gets it wrong every time on foreign policy" and it "will go down as one of the greatest defeats in American history".
In a strongly worded statement, Mr Trump said: "After I took out ISIS, I established a credible deterrent. That deterrent is now gone. The Taliban no longer has fear or respect for America, or America's power
