Biden to withdraw US troops from Afghanistan by 11 September
US President Joe Biden is set to withdraw all American troops from Afghanistan over the coming months in time for the 20th anniversary of 9/11, according to reports.
It means the US will likely miss a May deadline for a pullout agreed with the Taliban by the Trump administration last year.
Biden had previously said the 1 May deadline would be tough to meet.
The President is expected to announce the decision in a statement tomorrow, the Washington Post reported.
The US military has been engaged in Afghanistan since shortly after the 9/11 attacks on 11 September 2001.
There have been more than 2,400 US military deaths in Afghanistan since 2001, while over 20,000 US service members have been wounded in action, according to the US state department.
In February, the UN warned there had been a “disturbing spike” in the number of civilian deaths reported in Afghanistan since the launch of peace negotiations in September last year.
In 2019 alone, around 700 civilians in Afghanistan were killed, according to the Costs of War Project at Brown University.
The Taliban has vowed to renew attacks on US and NATO personnel if foreign troops are removed from the region by the May deadline.
However, it is not clear if militants will stick with their threats if Biden issues a fresh withdrawal date.
There are currently around 3,500 US troops in Afghanistan and an an additional 7,000 foreign forces, the bulk of whom are NATO troops.