Former army ranger urges Government to send elite force to get Irish citizens out of Afghanistan

Afghan people climb atop a plane as they wait at the Kabul airport in Kabul on Monday, as thousands of people mobbed the city's airport trying to flee the Taliban's feared hardline brand of Islamist rule. Picture: Wakil Kohsar / AFP via Getty Images

Ireland’s elite special forces should be deployed to Kabul airport to coordinate the evacuation of 33 Irish citizens, including eight children, trapped there.

A former officer in the Army Ranger Wing, Kildare South TD Cathal Berry, said that without a physical presence in Afghanistan, it was very difficult to organise any such mission.