The White House news conference is now over. In the final minutes Biden was asked again whether the Taliban was allowing US passport holders to enter Kabul airport.

Mr Biden says: "To the best of our knowledge, the Taliban checkpoints, they are letting through people showing American passports. Now, that's a different question when they get in the rush and crowd of all the folks just outside the wall, near the airport.

"That's why yesterday or the day before we went over the wall and brought in 169 Americans."

He adds: "What I was saying is we have an agreement that they will let past the checkpoints, that they... let Americans through."

Mr Biden's claim that Americans are being allowed into the Kabul airport has been met with scepticism from journalists, who have described the difficulty of reaching the US evacuation site.

Image source, Reuters

Biden is asked whether the US will send troops into central Kabul to extract any Americans unable to get to the airport.

He insists that this will not be necessary, since "we've made an agreement with the Taliban".

"Thus far," he says, every American passport holder has been allowed through.

Biden is now taking questions from journalists. He is asked whether the downfall of Afghanistan has led to a loss in US credibility on the world stage.

He says he has seen "no question of our credibility" from US allies.

"I have not seen that. As a matter of fact, it's the exact opposite," he insists, adding that the US has acted decisively in recent days.

"The past week has been heartbreaking," Biden says.

"We've seen gut-wrenching images of panicked people acting out of sheer desperation. You know, it's completely understandable. They're frightened. They're sad. Uncertain what happens next."

He continues by praising US soldiers still in Afghanistan, who are helping with the evacuation.

There are at least 5,000 US troops at Kabul airport, with the number expected to climb to 6,000 in the coming hours.

"They're performing to the highest standard under extraordinarily difficult circumstances," he says, also praising the US allies who still have troops in Afghanistan.

He continues by asking the American public to pray for the safety of allied security forces.

Image source, The White House

Biden says that the US is in "constant contact" with the Taliban.

He says the militant group that now controls the country has been told that they can expect a "swift and forceful response" from the US if it engages in any attacks on Americans.

He also pledges that officials are monitoring for any terror attacks, mentioning how prisons were emptied by the Taliban as they conquered the country.

"We paused flights out of Kabul this morning to make sure we could progress evacuees at their transit points," says Biden, adding that flights have now resumed.

He adds that 5,700 evacuees flew out yesterday, including 169 Americans who "got over the wall into the airport using military assets".

He adds that the US has also provided military support to allies, and foreign journalists still in Kabul.

"Let me be clear. Any American that wants to come, home we will get you home," he pledges.

But, he adds, "I cannot promise what the final outcome will be" due to the danger on the ground.

"Since I spoke on Monday we've made significant process," Biden begins, saying that the US has now secured Kabul airport and is proceeding with evacuations of civilians.

"This is one of the largest, most difficult airlifts in history," he says.

"And the only country in the world capable of projecting this much power on the far side of the world, with this degree of precision, is the United States of America."

US President Joe Biden has begun speaking at the White House - more than 40 minutes later than scheduled. We expect him to address the evacuation efforts in Kabul and again answer claims that his administration was taken by surprise by the Taliban’s advance.

Evacuation efforts in Kabul are "getting slightly better", UK Prime Minister Boris Johnson has said.

Speaking to reporters after a meeting of the government's emergency Cobra committee in London, he said: "We are seeing a stabilisation at the airport.

"Yesterday we were able to get out about 1,000 people, today another 1,000 people, and a lot of those are obviously UK-eligible persons coming back to this country, and a lot of them are people coming back under the Afghanistan resettlement and assistance programme."

Johnson added that he would work with the Taliban if necessary to "find a solution" for Afghanistan.

"I want to assure people that our political and diplomatic efforts to find a solution for Afghanistan - working with the Taliban, of course, if necessary - will go on. And our commitment to Afghanistan is lasting."

There is a "huge record to be proud of" at the end of a 20-year cycle of engagement in Afghanistan, he said.

"The UK armed forces, UK diplomats, aid workers, did help to change the lives of literally millions of people in Afghanistan, to help educate millions of women and young girls who would otherwise not have been educated, and to stop terrorism from coming to this country," he said.

The US Marine Corp spokesman has put out a short statement, confirming the veracity of a video showing desperate Afghan civilians passing an infant to US soldiers stationed at Kabul airport.

“I can confirm the uniformed service member depicted in the video is a Marine with the 24th Marine Expeditionary Unit," said Major Jim Stenger.

"The baby seen in the video was taken to a medical treatment facility on site and cared for by medical professionals.”

For many, the viral video from this week evoked memories of the US departure from Saigon at the end of the Vietnam War.

The Marines also tweeted a photo, showing one of their troops comforting the baby which was later reunited with the father.

Stun grenades have been used outside Kabul airport, as crowds throng the perimeter fence.

Afghans and foreign nationals have been at the airport in recent days trying to escape the country.

We should be hearing from Joe Biden shortly.

While the US president has faced much criticism for his handling of the US withdrawal from Afghanistan, polls in the US show that many Americans still support the decision to pull out the troops.

"The public opinion is pretty damn clear that Americans wanted out of the ongoing war and don't want to get back in. It's true today and it's going to be true in six months," one Biden ally is quoted by Reuters news agency as saying.

"It isn't about not caring or being empathetic about what's going on over there, but worrying about what's happening in America."

However, while Americans might agree with the decision to leave Afghanistan, they appear to be less impressed with the way President Biden has gone about it.

His approval rating has sunk to 46%, according to a Reuters/Ipsos poll – the lowest in weekly polls since he took office in January.

Image source, Reuters

Nato has urged the Taliban to allow people being evacuated to leave Afghanistan.

The organisation vowed that the allies would remain in "close coordination" while operations continue.

The joint declaration by Nato's 30 member countries was made following an emergency video conference.

"We call on those in positions of authority in Afghanistan to respect and facilitate their safe and orderly departure, including through Hamid Karzai International Airport in Kabul," the statement read.

"As long as evacuation operations continue, we will maintain our close operational coordination through allied military means at Hamid Karzai International Airport."

We are expecting to hear from US President Joe Biden in the next hour. He's likely to address evacuation efforts - but in recent days he has had to defend himself from claims he was taken by surprise by the Taliban's advance.

As recently as last month the US president said he believed the Afghan government had capacity to stay in control.

While he acknowledged the threat of a Taliban takeover, he told reporters: “The likelihood there’s going to be the Taliban overrunning everything and owning the whole country is highly unlikely.”

Since then, the Taliban have swept across the country and many in the Afghan government and armed forces have fled.

In an interview this week, Mr Biden denied he had made mistakes or that there had been a failure of intelligence.

"The idea that somehow there's a way to have gotten out without chaos ensuing, I don't know how that happens,” he told ABC News.

UK Prime Minister Boris Johnson has said he "absolutely" has full confidence in Dominic Raab following criticism of the British foreign secretary over his handling of the Afghanistan crisis.

Raab has rejected demands from the opposition to resign after his decision not to call his Afghan counterpart over evacuating translators who had helped UK forces.

Mr Raab said he prioritised "security" at Kabul airport and "delegated" the call to a junior minister.

But that call did not happen due to the "rapidly deteriorating situation" in Afghanistan, he added.

This is what it looks like outside Kabul's airport, where thousands have been fleeing to.

While flights have been taking off, the Taliban have been checking papers of people arriving so getting inside has proven difficult for many.

A man who was trafficked into the UK from Afghanistan as a teenager says he fears for the safety of his family still living in his home country.

Ahmed - not his real name - arrived as a 17-year-old in 1999 and now lives in Suffolk where he has raised a family.

He said he "doesn't know" if his mother and sister, who are still in the country, "can be safe", along with many thousands of other Afghans.

Watch his interview below.

Image source, Reuters

Russian President Vladimir Putin says that other countries "must not impose their values" on Afghanistan, and that as the Taliban now control most of the country, "we need to accept that it's a reality".

He adds that he hopes the Taliban will make good on their promises to restore order in Afghanistan.

These are the first comments the Russian leader has made about the crisis in Afghanistan.

Russia has a complicated history with Afghanistan. In 1978, during the Cold War, there was a communist coup in the country - uprisings against it then led to Soviet troops invading the following year.

Soviet forces fought against local jihadist insurgents - known as mujahideen - who were backed by the US and Pakistan.

The Soviet-Afghan war lasted for 10 years and was devastating for the country, with about one million Afghans killed. After the war, in-fighting between different mujahideen fighters eventually gave rise to the Taliban.

Image source, Reuters

Governments don't know which planes their evacuated citizens are on, the Dutch foreign minister says.

"Because of the chaos at the airport, we do not at this moment have a clear picture of which aeroplane our own people are on, or the citizens of other European countries or Nato allies, or of Afghani personnel - no country does," Sigrid Kaag says.

"We know that there are at this moment more than 700 Dutch nationals still in Afghanistan... and we have to bring them back."

Most Dutch diplomatic staff were evacuated on Sunday, but the ambassador and a small replacement team returned to Kabul two days later to oversee the evacuation.

Image source, PA Media

The former secretary general of Nato, Lord Robertson, has joined criticism of the UK foreign secretary over his handling of the Afghanistan crisis.

Dominic Raab has defended his decision not to call his Afghan counterpart over plans to evacuate translators who had helped UK forces - and pass the responsibility on to a junior minister. The call did not take place.

And speaking to the BBC, Lord Robertson, a former Labour defence secretary, said there had been a "dereliction of duty of major consequence" as Raab was on holiday abroad when "city after city was falling last week".

"Foreign ministers only talk to foreign ministers, not junior ministers. They should have been talking to the Afghan foreign minister much earlier than last Friday anyway. They should have been trying to sort out the exit of our vulnerable people before that," he added.

Lord Robertson also called the current situation in Afghanistan a "shameful ending" to a mission that achieved much for society in the country.