U.S. President Joe Biden said on Friday at a meeting with Afghan President Ashraf Ghani that the partnership between the United States and Afghanistan "is not ending, it's going to be sustained," despite the planned pullout of U.S. troops.

The visit of the Afghan leader came amid a deteriorating security situation in the war-torn country, where the U.S. military has completed the withdrawal of more than half of its troops stationed there. 

Biden said at the beginning of their meeting that "our troops may be leaving but support for Afghanistan is not ending in terms of support and maintenance of helping maintain their military as well as economic and political support." 

"Afghans are going to have to decide their future ... senseless violence has to stop," he continued. 

Ghani noted that the Afghan-U.S. partnership is entering a new chapter, adding that Afghan security forces had retaken six districts on Friday.

He acknowledged that Biden was not going to change course from his April announcement ordering the end to America's longest war. 

"President Biden's decision has been historic, it has made everybody recalculate and reconsider," Ghani said. "We are here to respect it and support it."

Ghani was in Washington along with Abdullah Abdullah, who oversees Kabul's peace negotiations with the Taliban, amid rising uncertainty over the group's recent military gains and the possibility of their return to power.

The U.S. pullout, of some 2,500 troops and 16,000 civilian contractors that were in the country this year, could be mostly completed next month. 

(Cover: U.S. President Joe Biden meets visiting Afghan President Ashraf Ghani at the White House, in Washington, D.C., U.S., June 25, 2021. /Reuters)

(With input from agencies)