Can Australopithecus be ranked among humans?

They were not particularly similar to people in the modern sense of the word, to put it mildly. But it was with them that human evolution began, so in principle they can be counted among people. They belonged to the genus of hominids. They can be characterized as people who had all the characteristics of monkeys. Of course, outwardly they looked more like monkeys. The earliest remains of these “creatures” were found in the Republic of Chad. These remains are approximately six million years old. But the most recent remains were also found in Africa, only in its southern part.