Afghan President Ashraf Ghani has left the country

(CNN) – A senior Afghan official and senior diplomat told CNN that Afghan President Ashraf Ghani had left the country.

Abdullah Abdullah, the Afghan head of the High Council for National Reconciliation, also said in a video statement that President Ghani had left the country, referring to him as a “former president.”

CNN previously reported that they were taking place Debates at the Presidential Palace Between government officials in Kabul and representatives of the Taliban.

Ghani is a former economist and educator who has served as President of Afghanistan since 2014. He was re-elected September 2019, But for a reason Long process He did not take office until March 2020.

He was an American citizen, but left his passport to run in the 2009 presidential election in Afghanistan.

Kazi previously taught anthropology at the University of Berkeley and Johns Hopkins in the United States between 1983 and 1991, and later began working for the World Bank. He was at the Global Financial Institution in Washington during the 9/11 attacks and used the tragedy to re-engage in Afghan politics, returning to his home country a few months after the event.

A Taliban spokesman confirmed they were in Kabul

Taliban spokesman Jabihullah Mujahid said in a statement on Sunday that the Taliban had entered Kabul as Afghan government security forces relinquished their positions in some parts of the city.

In that statement, the Taliban asked the people not to be afraid of the Taliban.

“This is definitely a great update,” Clarissa Ward, CNN’s international chief correspondent, told CNN’s Fareed Zakaria, “It will definitely scare many who face an uncertain future.”

Ward explained that people are now panicking as the Taliban grow closer and closer.

“People here woke up in the morning to hear the news that there were Taliban in the suburbs of Kabul. There was chaos in the streets. People were doing double parking, people were driving on the wrong side of the road. People were in a panic. There was a rush in the banks. People were waiting in long queues outside the passport office,” he said.

The Taliban have made significant progress in taking control of all the other major cities in the country in two weeks.