TWO British adults and the child of a British national have been confirmed to be among the people killed in an attack at the Kabul airport.
A further two people were injured in the attack outside of the Hamid Karzai International Airport, Foreign Secretary Dominic Raab confirmed.
US officials now believe there was just one blast at Kabul airport yesterday, rather than the originally suspected two.
It is understood the British child who died was a teenager, while those injured are an adult British national and an Afghan child with a British family.
SNP Westminster leader Ian Blackford (below) said in light of the British deaths, the UK “must not abandon those we have a responsibility to protect”.
He said: "This is devastating news. My heart goes out to the victims, their families, our personnel on the ground, and to the vulnerable Afghan people stuck in this nightmare situation.
"The UK Government must do everything it can to ensure safe routes for the evacuation, relocation and resettlement of those left behind - and substantially increase the number of Afghan refugees the UK plans to take.
"We must not abandon those we have a responsibility to protect."
As well as the British casualties, officials have said at least 13 US troops and 60 Afghan nationals were killed – and more than 150 people were injured – in a “complex attack” on Thursday.
Foreign Secretary Raab (below) said that it was a "tragedy" that innocent people seeking to bring loved ones to safety in the UK were "murdered by cowardly terrorists".
He added: “Yesterday’s despicable attack underlines the dangers facing those in Afghanistan and reinforces why we are doing all we can to get people out. We are offering consular support to their families.
“We will not turn our backs on those who look to us in their hour of need, and we will never be cowed by terrorists.”
UK Prime Minister Boris Johnson and US President Joe Biden have vowed to continue the evacuation effort in Afghanistan despite the attack.
The Pentagon said today that it had incorrectly reported that there had been two bombings in Kabul.
Major General Hank Taylor of the Pentagon’s Joint Staff told reporters that it is now believed there was no attack at the Baron’s Hotel, where processing was taking place.
He said that the US military report was incorrect and attributed the mistake to confusion in the aftermath of the violence.
But earlier Defence Secretary Ben Wallace (below) warned that the threat from terror groups will only “grow the closer we get to leaving” following the attack, believed to have been carried out by the Isis-K affiliate of so-called Islamic State.
Despite airlifting nearly 14,000 people out of Afghanistan in the past two weeks, Wallace said “the sad fact is not every single one will get out”.
He declined to give a timeline for the exit of British forces as they processed approximately 1000 further evacuees already in the airport but acknowledged it would come before the Americans withdraw, with Biden having set the departure deadline of Tuesday.
Wallace said the Baron Hotel processing centre was closed at 4.30am, as was the Abbey Gate to Hamid Karzai International Airport.
“We will process the people that we’ve brought with us, the 1000 people approximately in the airfield now, and we will seek a way to continue to find a few people in the crowds where we can, but overall the main processing is now closed and we have a matter of hours,” he told Sky News.
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