The Taliban, in a lightning offensive across the country, returned to power on 15 August 2021 as Western forces, including Britain and the US, hurriedly made their withdrawal after a 20-year occupation.

Operation Pitting was the largest evacuation effort Britain has been involved in since the Second World War, with more than 15,000 people taken from Afghanistan to the UK in just over 16 days.

Sir Laurie Bristow said while no one is going to recognise the Taliban government any time soon, "there is a difference between recognition and engagement".

He said the UK has a "pragmatic channel of dialogue with the Taliban" but that it's not the right time to establish an embassy there or to give the Taliban the "credibility or prestige of dealing with them at very senior levels".

"But we do need to engage on the things that matter to us," he said.

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He said the three key issues are the humanitarian crisis, security threats and the treatment of women and girls.

Sir Laurie told Mark Austin on Sky News' Newshour: "At the moment I think what we're seeing is a Taliban that are every bit as repressive as we feared they would be. We need to be clear about who these people are and what they represent.

"They fought their way to power. They overthrew the internationally recognised government that we all supported, that we'd invested so much in."

He said finding ways of supporting the people who live in Afghanistan without supporting the Taliban will be a "really, really long, hard haul".

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"We have an obligation to them as a nation. They were trying to achieve the same things that we were trying to achieve and their lives are at risk," he said.

He said ways need to be found to get the people at greatest risk out of Afghanistan as quickly as possible and accepted that some may arrive on small boats.

Aid organisations have also urged the UK not to "abandon" Afghanistan.

Bond, an umbrella body in the UK representing international development organisations, said the Afghan people had been living "in a waking nightmare" since the return of the fundamentalist Taliban regime.

The organisation said more than 80% of the population in the central Asian country is living below the poverty line "as the economy continues to contract, jobs vanish and government services crumble".