As the Taliban took control of the country in August, international funding to Afghanistan got suspended and billions of dollars of the country’s assets abroad, mostly in the US, got frozen.
President Joe Biden, on Friday, freed and split $7 billion between humanitarian aid for Afghanistan and a fund for September 11 victims. It would immediately release no money, but Biden’s order calls for banks to provide $3.5 billion of the frozen amount to a trust fund for distribution through humanitarian groups for Afghan relief and basic needs. The other $3.5 billion would stay in the US to finance payments from lawsuits by US victims of terrorism that are still working their way through the courts.
Pakistan has called for returning Afghanistan’s national assets, held in the United States, to the Afghan people. Ambassador Munir Akram, Pakistan’s permanent representative to the United Nations (UN) in New York, said the money was “critically needed” to revive the economy of the war-battered country. The Pakistani diplomat said returning these assets at this critical juncture would be the most effective and generous display of solidarity with the people of Afghanistan. Asked to comment on the US move to split $7 billion in assets from the Afghan central bank, Ambassador Akram remarked, “Half a loaf is better than none.” He, however, said there was something wrong with a financial system where ‘one state can unilaterally block the national assets of another to pay off questionable claims by its citizens.’
Author: Shiza Safdar
Student of IR at National Defence University