UK knew last year Taliban would seize Afghanistan: Official
London only miscalculated how long it would take: National security adviser
Stephen Lovegrove: ‘We certainly did not have the speed of the collapse as the central scenario, in fact nobody did’
Updated 21 October 2021
Arab News
LONDON: Britain expected Afghanistan to fall to the Taliban from the moment the US signed its withdrawal deal with the group 18 months ago, a senior official has admitted.
Stephen Lovegrove, the UK’s national security adviser, told a parliamentary committee that the government only miscalculated how long it would take for the group to retake Afghanistan.
“There was a central assessment that ultimately what would happen would be that there would be a government which is either entirely Taliban or dominated by the Taliban,” Lovegrove told a joint committee convened to examine claims that the government failed to heed warnings by the British ambassador about the group’s advances.
“We thought that there was a considerably lower likelihood — though not negligible likelihood — of civil war,” said Lovegrove.
“But when we were thinking about the Taliban-dominated government and how quickly that would come to pass, we certainly did not have the speed of the collapse as the central scenario, in fact nobody did. The Taliban didn’t, the Afghan government didn’t, the Americans didn’t.”
The rapid fall of Afghanistan to the Taliban this year appeared to catch world powers off guard.
But Lovegrove’s admission is the first time a British official has acknowledged that the UK acted in expectation of a Taliban takeover, rather than their entry into a democratic or power-sharing government.
World powers are still coming to terms with Afghanistan’s new government, and most have not yet recognized the Taliban as the official rulers of the country.
Communications director Steven Cheung calls CNN cowardly for not inviting Trump adviser Stephen Miller to be interviewed
On Wednesday, President Donald Trump accused a CNN journalist of being “an arm of the Democrat Party”
Updated 56 min 13 sec ago
AFP
WASHINGTON: The White House on Thursday intensified its attacks on CNN, the news network at the center of a financial battle that President Donald Trump is tied up in politically and through family.
Echoing the president’s frequent anti-media barbs, senior members of his administration lashed out.
“CNN = Chicken News Network,” White House communications director Steven Cheung wrote on X Thursday, calling CNN cowardly for not inviting Trump adviser Stephen Miller to be interviewed “presumably because they are scared Stephen will school them.”
Vice President JD Vance then shared the post, adding: “If CNN wants to be a real news network it should feature important voices from our administration.”
A CNN spokesperson said Miller would be welcome back on the channel, Fox News reported Thursday.
“As a news organization, we make editorial decisions about the stories we cover and when, and that depends on the news priorities of the day. We look forward to having Stephen on again in the future as the news warrants,” the CNN spokesperson was quoted as saying.
The harshest attack on CNN from the Trump administration came from an official White House account called Rapid Response 47, which went after Kaitlan Collins, one of the network’s most prominent correspondents, saying she “is not a journalist. She is a mouthpiece for the Democrat Party.”
On Wednesday, the president confronted another CNN journalist similarly, and said “you know you work for the Democrats, don’t you? You are basically an arm of the Democrat Party.”
CNN has yet to comment publicly on those allegations. In the past, the network has responded to criticism of political bias by asserting that it is committed to objective journalism and fairness.
CNN for sale
Founded in 1980 to provide global television news coverage, CNN is currently owned by Warner Bros. Discovery, the media conglomerate at the heart of a bidding war between streaming giant Netflix and Paramount Skydance, the latter of which is led by CEO David Ellison, son of Trump ally Larry Ellison.
Skydance Media CEO David Ellison attends the premiere of "Fountain of Youth" at the American Museum of Natural History, May 19, 2025, in New York. (Invision/AP, File)
The president’s son-in-law Jared Kushner has joined Paramount’s bid through his investment firm.
And Trump has already indicated he intends to get involved in the government’s decision to approve or block a sale, which would typically involve the Justice Department.
Under Paramount’s offer, CNN would fall into Ellison’s hands.
Under the Netflix deal, Warner Bros. Discovery would sell off CNN and other cable news properties separately before closing the sale of its studio and streaming operations.
The 79-year-old president said Wednesday he wants to ensure CNN gets new ownership as part of the Warner Bros. Discovery sale, seeming to favor a Paramount purchase.
“I don’t think the people that are running that company right now and running CNN, which is a very dishonest group of people, I don’t think that should be allowed to continue. I think CNN should be sold along with everything else,” Trump said.
