President Mohammad Ashraf Ghani is in the United Arab Emirates with his family

The United Arab Emirates (UAE) has announced that Afghan President Mohammad Ashraf Ghani has arrived in the United Arab Emirates with his family.

The UAE Ministry of Foreign Affairs said in a brief statement that it welcomed President Ghani and his family on humanitarian grounds.

Mr Ghani had left the capital on Sunday evening, hours before the Taliban took control of Kabul, and his whereabouts were unknown.

Earlier, unconfirmed reports suggested that Ghani may have traveled to Tajikistan or Uzbekistan with his close advisers.

But now the UAE has officially acknowledged that Mr Ghani is in the country with his family.

Hours after leaving the country, Mohammad Ashraf Ghani wrote on his personal Facebook page that he had decided to leave the palace and leave the country to prevent bloodshed in Kabul. He wrote;

"Today I am faced with a difficult choice; to face the armed Taliban who want to enter the palace, or to leave the country where I have dedicated my life to protecting and nurturing it for the last 20 years. The countless patriots would have been martyred and the city of Kabul would have been devastated, resulting in a massive humanitarian catastrophe in the six-million-strong city. "To prevent a bloody attack on Kabul and the people of Kabul Sharif, I decided to leave."