On Tuesday, hundreds of protesters marched across Kabul towards the now inactive United States (US) embassy, demanding the release of frozen Afghan assets held in the US Federal Reserve.
The protesters chanted anti-America slogans and carried banners that said “Let us eat” and “Give us our frozen money” as they marched down Kabul’s central avenue under the ruling Taliban’s security. In a separate demonstration, a coalition of Afghan private businesses distributed copies of an open letter written to US Secretary of State Antony Blinken, urging him to release Washington’s frozen funds of $600 million in unpaid bills for services under government contracts and internationally funded projects. They argued that America’s actions targeting the Taliban have had a “devastating impact” on “non-political” ordinary Afghans and private-sector workers.
Afghanistan’s aid-dependent economy was devastated after the US froze $9.5 billion in Afghan central bank funds and imposed sanctions following the ouster of the previous US-backed government in mid-August. The World Bank and the International Monetary Fund also ended their financial assistance to development programmes in Afghanistan following the Taliban takeover.
A group of senior US diplomats had met a Taliban delegation led by acting Foreign Minister Amir Khan in Doha, Qatar, last month. However, while the talks were described as “positive,” there has been no change in the US’ policy on the frozen funds. In fact, the Taliban made another public plea for the release of the funds just this past weekend at a United Nations (UN)-organised event, saying that failure to do so could lead to another exodus of Afghans into neighbouring countries and exacerbate the country’s already spiralling humanitarian crisis.
Keeping this in mind, on Monday, a group of 48 Democrat and Republican lawmakers wrote a letter to President Joe Biden demanding the urgent release of funds to protect Afghan civilians. The lawmakers argued that Washington’s punitive measures against the Taliban hurt the Afghan people who have already suffered decades of war. Referring to the US withholding $9.4 billion in Afghanistan’s currency reserves, the lawmakers said, “The US is contributing to soaring inflation and the shuttering of commercial banks and vital private businesses, plunging the country…deeper into an economic and humanitarian crisis.”
The Taliban’s Ministry of Foreign Affairs spokesperson, Abdul Qahar Balkhi, welcomed the move and urged the Biden administration to alleviate the suffering of the Afghan people.
Freezing reserves of the Central Bank and creating difficulties for the banking system leads to human suffering.
— Abdul Qahar Balkhi (@QaharBalkhi) December 22, 2021
In a press conference on Tuesday, Blinken emphasised that the US is the single largest provider of humanitarian assistance to Afghanistan. He also confirmed the recent release of $280 million in the Afghan Trust Fund monies to liquidate the Afghan economy and provide immediate monetary assistance to the people. On the same day, the Canadian Minister of International Development Harjit S Sajjan pledged $56 million in urgent humanitarian funding to the people of Afghanistan.
The United Nations’ World Food Programme has said that 22.8 million out of the 38 million Afghans currently face acute food shortages. Given the rising rate of malnutrition in the country. there are now one million children at risk of dying.