The United States carried out a military strike on Sunday in Kabul, two US officials told Reuters. A US military spokesman confirmed that the strike was carried out against a vehicle in Kabul, with the AP noting that the vehicle contained "multiple" suicide bombers.
The official, speaking on condition of anonymity, said the strike targeted suspected ISIS-K militants. They said they were citing initial information and cautioned it could change.
A Taliban spokesperson claimed the target was an ISIS-K suicide bomber who was planning to carry out an attack at the Kabul airport, reports say.
CNN: US carried out a defensive airstrike in Kabul Sunday on a suspected ISIS-K car bomb that was targeting the airport, according to US defense official.
— Jim Acosta (@Acosta) August 29, 2021
On Saturday, US President Joe Biden promised further strikes against the Islamic State in Afghanistan in retaliation for a deadly bombing outside Kabul airport. "This strike was not the last. We will continue to hunt down any person involved."
This news comes as another massive explosion was heard in Afghanistan's Kabul on Sunday afternoon, a few days after a double suicide bombing attack killed dozens near the city's airport.
Another large explosion in Kabul today https://t.co/d10ZzygfLg
— Anna Ahronheim (@AAhronheim) August 29, 2021
Eyewitnesses in Kabul say the explosion was a rocket hit at a house in a residential region close to the airport, but these reports are still unconfirmed. Television footage from the scene showed black smoke billowing into the sky above buildings.
Thus far there have been no official reports of casualties or injuries.
Late Saturday night, the US State Department Bureau of Consular Affairs issued an immediate warning for US citizens to evacuate areas near the Kabul airport due to a "specific, credible threat."
US forces were in the final phase of pulling out of Kabul on Sunday, ending two decades of costly involvement in Afghanistan, as the country's new Taliban rulers prepared to take control of the airport.
Just over 1,000 civilians remained at the airport on Sunday to be flown out before the troops finally leave, a Western security official told Reuters.
US President Joe Biden has said he will stick by his deadline to withdraw all US troops from Afghanistan by Tuesday. A US official told Reuters on Saturday that fewer than 4,000 troops remained at the airport.
US and allied forces have mounted a massive two-week effort to ferry foreign nationals and tens of thousands of vulnerable Afghans out of the country.
The airlift - one of the biggest such evacuation operations ever - marked the end of a 20-year Western mission in Afganistan that began when US-led forces ousted a Taliban government that had provided safe haven for the perpetrators of the Sept. 11, 2001 attacks on the United States.
This is a developing story.