Watchdog Report: U.S. Has Given Afghanistan $11 Billion in Aid Since Disastrous Biden WithdrawalJohn Hayward 2 Nov 2023
John Sopko, the Special Inspector General for Afghanistan Reconstruction (SIGAR), issued his latest report on Monday.
The report revealed the United States and its allies have supported the Afghan economy with “cash shipments” averaging $80 million that “arrive in Kabul every 10-14 days” ever since the Taliban takeover and President Joe Biden’s disastrous withdrawal in 2021. The U.S. has sent over $11 billion in assistance to Afghanistan and Afghan refugees since then.
Sopko quoted U.N. assurances that the money is “placed in designated U.N. accounts in a private bank,” rather than being “deposited in the central bank or provided to the Taliban.”
The U.N. Assistance Mission in Afghanistan (UNAMA) stressed that the cash deliveries are “carefully monitored, audited, inspected, and vetted in accordance with U.N. financial rules and processes.”
SIGAR did not wade into the argument about the fungibility of foreign aid money that has raged ever since the Biden administration paid a $6 billion ransom to Iran for five hostages. If the U.S. and other governments are spending $3 billion to feed, house, and medicate Afghans, it frees up $3 billion for the irresponsible and malevolent Taliban government to spend on its unsavory priorities.
Also, while humanitarian groups correctly point out that economic instability hurts the poorest residents of Afghanistan, the Taliban is poised to reap benefits from the economy that American taxpayers have spent so much money “stabilizing.”
SIGAR did, however, note that the Taliban has a long history of stealing foreign aid, blocking oppressed minority populations from receiving it, and “siphoning cash from U.N. shipments, or collecting royalties, or charging fees on cash shipments.”
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