US defence secretary to visit Bahrain next week

TDT | Manama

The Daily Tribune – www.newsofbahrain.com

Lloyd Austin, the US Defence Secretary, will visit Bahrain and other GCC countries next week, the Pentagon said yesterday. The visit dubbed the “thank you” tour is to allies and troops that helped the US in the airlift from Afghanistan. Bahrain had allowed flights to makes use of its transit facilities to ease the evacuation process.

Besides Bahrain, Austin will visit Saudi Arabia, Qatar and Kuwait. Austin, who plans to leave on Sunday, will meet with regional officials, US service members and other government staff.

“Throughout his trip, Secretary Austin will meet with regional partners and thank them for their cooperation with the United States as we evacuated Americans, Afghans and citizens from other nations from Afghanistan,” Pentagon spokesman John Kirby said in a statement.

The United States’ longest war culminated with a hastily organised airlift that left thousands of US-allied Afghans behind and was punctuated by a suicide bombing outside Kabul’s airport that killed 13 US troops and scores of Afghans.

It was one of the largest airlifts in history, evacuating more than 120,000 Americans, Afghans and people of other nationalities.