Several clips from Afghanistan show people handing crying babies over barbed wire fences around Kabul Airport, in an attempt to get them to safety.
One clip was shared by Matt Zeller, an activist and Afghanistan veteran, on Twitter, and suggests adults in the country are now prioritising their children’s escape over their own.
Zeller captioned the video: “Throngs of people make it impossible to get to the gates of #KabulAirport.”
The clamouring crowds are clearly passing at least one child over their heads to the front of the queue, towards a barbed wire fence.
This video was shared in the early hours of Thursday morning. Another clip where adults hand a toddler to a US soldier behind a wall at Kabul airport also emerged on Thursday.
This was shared on Twitter by BBC correspondent Yalda Hakim.
Her caption read: “The horror at Kabul airport continues – gut-wrenching scenes of a toddler being passed through the crowd to an American soldier behind a wall #Afghanistan.”
There have been further reports of similar events happening around the airport, particularly near the entrance to the Baron hotel where Afghans wanting UK refuge have gathered. The area is guarded by British Parachute Regiment troops.
One British soldier told The Independent: “The mothers were desperate, they were getting beaten by the Taliban.
“They shouted ‘save my baby’ and threw the babies to us.
“Some of the babies fell on the barbed wire. It was awful what happened.
“By the end of the night there wasn’t one man among us who was not crying.”
Widespread panic is gripping Afghanistan at the moment after the terror group the Taliban took control of the country on Sunday.
The militants have a history of oppression and violence, particularly towards women and dissidents.
Now, Afghans are desperate to flee, but the only viable means out is through catching a plane from the capital city of Kabul.
The airport there is one of the very last places still under the influence of US troops, but Afghans need passports or official documents if they are to travel legally out of their home country.
Zeller tweeted: “The Taliban have checkpoints everywhere. If they find that you are carrying a passport or English documents or communications of any kind, they immediately confiscate them. Good luck getting the gate through without any documents or phones.”
The Taliban are reportedly using gun fire, whips and sticks to keep the crowds outside Kabul Airport at bay.
Eyewitnesses told Reuters that Taliban fighters were deliberately preventing civilians from getting into the compound, even if they had the correct documents to legally travel.
Other reports claim the militants formed a “ring of steel” around the airport so they could beat up Afghans.
