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Read, Debate: Engage.
| topic: | Political violence |
|---|---|
| located: | Afghanistan, USA |
| editor: | Shadi Khan Saif |
In a yet another utterly bizarre move, President Joe Biden’s proposed splitting of Afghanistan’s state reserves, which are kept frozen in the US, amounts to nothing less than a dishonour to the victims of 9/11 and a theft of the war-ravaged Afghans' assets.
As per his latest decree, President Biden has decided to recommend directing $3.5 billion of Afghanistan’s $7 billion in foreign currency reserves in the United States to a trust fund for humanitarian assistance to Afghanistan, while agreeing to release another $3.5 billion to families of the victims of the September 11, 2001 attacks.
On the surface this might not appear to be something extraordinary - especially to a Western audience that is less informed on the realities that Afghans have faced throughout the 20 years of bloody war and its terrible end-game by the US.
But, in reality, this is a blatant disrespect not only to the 9/11 victims and their families, but to all others who lost their lives and fortunes in the 20 years of the so-called ‘war on terror’. What the US President has proposed entails financially compensating one group of victims of terrorism with the assets belonging to the other group of victims.
The Afghanistan state reserves kept in the US and other Western financial institutions remain the sole property of that nation and shall remain honestly kept where it is until a recognised and accepted government is formed in Kabul, which can decide its future use.
Beyond this legal and technical point, this robing of the poor and needy country’s state reserves will have massive trickle-down effects on the country’s economy, resulting in a drastic devaluation of the currency, and therefore a skyrocketing of prices of basic commodities - this in a country where nearly 90 percent of the population is already battling crippling poverty.
Rights groups have warned that, if implemented, the decision by the US President would create a problematic precedent for commandeering sovereign wealth and will do little to address the underlying factors driving Afghanistan’s massive humanitarian crisis.
Directing $3.5 billion to humanitarian assistance for Afghans may sound generous, but it should be remembered that the entire $7 billion already legally belong to the Afghan people, said the Human Rights Watch. And yet, even if the US gave these funds to a humanitarian trust fund, current restrictions on Afghanistan’s banking sector make it virtually impossible to send or spend the money inside the sanctioned country, HRW added.
The way the US orchestrated the end-game for its so-called ‘war on terror’ by sidelining an elected government in Kabul to strike a deal with the Taliban group (which it initially blamed for the 9/11 attacks), and now splitting that country’s state funds makes one shiver about what Washington might have planned next for Afghanistan.
The 9/11 victims genuinely deserve compensation, as do all the victims of the 20 years of war in Afghanistan - but not in this undignified way.
Photo by Farid Ershad
