"LET THE PEOPLE STARVE": $7 billion in Afghan assets frozen in the U.S. / Millions facing starvation and almost the entire country – 98% – short of food
“This money does not belong to any government … this money belongs to the people of Afghanistan.”
Joe Biden signed an executive order on Friday releasing $7bn in frozen Afghan reserves to be split between humanitarian efforts for the Afghan people and American victims of terrorism, including relatives of 9/11.
In a highly unusual move, the convoluted plan is designed to tackle a myriad of legal bottlenecks stemming from the 2001 terrorist attacks and the chaotic end of the 20-year war in Afghanistan, which ignited a humanitarian and political crisis, . .critics warned that it could tip Afghanistan’s already-strained banking system over the edge into systemic failure and deepen a humanitarian crisis that has left millions facing starvation and almost the entire country – 98% – short of food.
Two narratives are included in this post today -- the first is an NPR podcast with the transcript included:
Millions of Afghans are on the brink of starvation.
NPR's Leila Fadel talks to Naser Shahalemi, founder of the group End Afghan Starvation, about how the U.S. is splitting up the Afghan assets.
There are about $7 billion of Afghan funds from the country's central bank frozen in the United States. Afghanistan's economy is on the verge of collapse. Inflation is soaring, and millions of Afghans are on the brink of starvation. So what's happening with that money?
On Friday, President Biden signed an executive order that would seize the Afghan assets and move half to a fund designated for humanitarian aid for Afghanistan. The administration nodded to legal wranglings with some 9/11 families pursuing claims against those assets as the reason for not trying to free the other half of Afghan funds for the Afghan people. And that decision - well, it sparked outrage.
Naser Shahalemi is the founder of an Afghan advocacy organization called End Afghan Starvation. It's been fighting to free those funds. He joins me now. Good morning.
[...]
FADEL: So, Naser, what was your reaction to this announcement last week?
SHAHALEMI: Well, initially there was a deep amount of shock initially as we were waiting to see what would happen with the frozen funds and what the course of action was going to be from the White House. We were dismayed. We were shocked. We were appalled. We were in complete awe of what the decision was, and we hope that a better decision can come about this and this decision could get rescinded at some level.
FADEL: What would you say to the Biden administration, which is saying that this is its way of getting at least some of the money to Afghanistan?
SHAHALEMI: Yeah. I mean, the way that they divided this money was absolutely illogical because first we need to decipher who has the right to decide another country's national assets and federal reserve. The United States spent 20 years developing the federal reserve with Afghanistan, and then to, you know, dismantle it and leave it in a paralyzed state is not very copacetic for the future of Afghanistan or the economic growth of Afghanistan.
FADEL: Give us a sense of the humanitarian situation in Afghanistan right now, nearly six months since the U.S. withdrawal.
SHAHALEMI: Yeah, the humanitarian situation is horrific at this point. The majority of the people of Afghanistan are starving, and they are locked out of their funds. They cannot access their bank cards. They cannot access their bank accounts. Many of them are in a position where - that they shouldn't need to be because they do have money in the banks.
FADEL: Yeah.
SHAHALEMI: They do have the ability to take care of themselves. But because of the sanctions, they've been locked away from their own money. And if that happened in America, people would be in outrage.
FADEL: And the sanctions you refer to are the sanctions on the Taliban, which is now in control of the country. What do you say to people who say, well, if this money goes back to Afghanistan, it will just go into the hands of the Taliban?
SHAHALEMI: It's not really how it works. Ultimately, this money that was in the federal reserve of Afghanistan's central bank was there to bolster the afghani note and to keep it steady. The money is - that money is hard-earned taxpayer Afghan money that was collected over 20 years...
FADEL: We saw demonstrations over the weekend condemning this move from the administration. What were the hopes for these funds?
SHAHALEMI: The hope for these funds was that it would be returned to the people of Afghanistan and that they would be allowed to use it for economic purposes, for business, day-to-day businesses.
The latest bid to unlock aid follows meetings in Oslo late last month between Taliban representatives and governments that heavily bankrolled Afghanistan’s previous government, which imploded in the face of a Taliban military offensive in August last year.
Karzai: Biden order on frozen funds ‘atrocity against Afghans’
President Biden signed an order to free $7.1bn in Afghan assets to be divided between 9/11 victims and humanitarian aid to Afghans
14 Feb 2022
"Former Afghanistan President Hamid Karzai has called a White House order to unfreeze $3.5bn in Afghan assets held in the United States for families of 9/11 victims an atrocity against the Afghan people.
Karzai, at a packed news conference, sought the help of Americans, particularly the families of the thousands killed in the September 11, 2001, attacks on the United States, to press President Joe Biden to rescind last week’s order.
“The people of Afghanistan share the pain of the American people, share the pain of the families and loved ones of those who died, who lost their lives in the tragedy of September 11,” said Karzai.
“We commiserate with them [but] Afghan people are as much victims as those families who lost their lives. Withholding money or seizing money from the people of Afghanistan in their name is unjust and unfair and an atrocity against Afghan people.”
President Biden’s order, signed last Friday, freed $7.1bn in Afghan assets currently held in the US, to be divided between September 11 victims and humanitarian aid to Afghans. . .[ ]
The $3.5bn was set aside for a US court to decide whether it can be used to settle claims by families of 9/11 victims.
US courts would also have to sign off before the release of humanitarian assistance money.
We “ask the US courts to do the opposite, to return the Afghan money back to the Afghan people”, said Karzai. . ."
![<div class=__reading__mode__extracted__imagecaption>Former Afghan leader Karzai called on President Joe Biden to rescind last week's order [Pablo Martinez Monsivais/AP Photo]](https://www.aljazeera.com/wp-content/uploads/2017/11/77f8641e3d924c75b06d7c0c9f84e6d4_18.jpeg?resize=770%2C513)
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