U.S. braces for more ISIS attacks after 85 killed in Kabul airport carnage

Summary

•  Attack kills at least 85 in all: 72 Afghans, 13 U.S. soldiers
• Evacuations accelerate despite ISIS threat - Western official
• Biden says U.S. will hunt bombers down
• Foreign forces aim to get citizens embassy staff out by Aug. 30
• Nearly 100,000 evacuated in 12 days

Aug 27 (Reuters) - U.S. forces helping to evacuate Afghans desperate to flee Taliban rule braced for more attacks on Friday after an Islamic State suicide bomber killed 85 people, including 13 U.S. soldiers outside the gates of Kabul airport.

Two blasts and gunfire rocked the area outside the airport on Thursday evening, witnesses said. Video shot by Afghan journalists showed dozens of bodies strewn around a canal on the edge of the airport.

A health official and a Taliban official said the toll of Afghans killed had risen to 72, including 28 Taliban members, although a Taliban spokesman later denied that any of their fighters guarding the airport perimeter had been killed.

The U.S. military said 13 of its service members were killed.

Islamic State (ISIS), an enemy of the Taliban as well as the West, said one of its suicide bombers targeted “translators and collaborators with the American army”. U.S. officials vowed retribution.