US allocates $327mln aid to Afghanistan while still freezing assets
Blinken pledges to commit hundreds of millions of dollars of humanitarian aid to Afghanistan.
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US Secretary of State Antony Blinken (AFP)
Washington has announced its allocation of $327 million in humanitarian aid to Afghanistan, according to US Secretary of State Antony Blinken on Friday.
"The United States is providing nearly $327 in additional humanitarian assistance to help the people of Afghanistan," Blinken said.
Washington is notoriously known for using aid as a weapon of co-dependency; simultaneously, it refuses to unfreeze Afghan assets worth billions of dollars.
Last week, hundreds of Afghans gathered in front of the former office of the Afghan Human Rights Commission in the capital, Kabul, to protest against the United States' announcement to transfer part of Afghanistan's national reserves to a trust fund in Switzerland, calling for the full release of assets.
At the moment, a protest is going in the Dar al-Aman area of Kabul city by the Afghans, in which they demand the release of the frozen assets of Afghanistan by the United States and their handover to Afghanistan.#Unfreezeafghanassets pic.twitter.com/aXYUMmIWq1
— AKStanikzai (@AKS_400) September 17, 2022
The demonstrators raised banners and chanted anti-US slogans, blaming it for the ongoing humanitarian and economic crisis in Afghanistan.
The demonstrators demanded the immediate and complete release of the reserves of the Central Bank of Afghanistan and issued a statement at the end of the demonstration, accusing the US-led forces of committing war crimes and heinously killing innocent Afghan men, women, and children.
Last week, Washington unveiled plans to create an external fund to administer $3.5 billion of Afghanistan's stolen national reserves, the Taliban said that the US had "usurped" Afghan assets. Upon revealing the fund, the US argued that it could "not trust" the Taliban with the country's money.
The US placed a $7 billion asset freeze on the Afghan central bank in August of last year, which exacerbated the poverty crisis brought on by decades of US occupation, followed by the US forces' chaotic withdrawal and the fall of the US-supported government and thus the suspension of foreign aid.
