Afghan activists, international charities and academics have slammed Washington's plan to use half of the USD$7 billion in frozen assets from the Afghan central bank to satisfy lawsuits over the September 11 terror attacks.
US administration officials said on Friday they would work to ensure access to USD$3.5 billion of the assets would benefit the Afghan people.
The other half of the funds would remain in the United States, subject to ongoing litigation targeting the Taliban, including by relatives of those who died in the September 11 attacks, the officials said.
The proposal sparked Afghans to take to the streets of Kabul on Saturday, with protesters holding signs reading: "USA stole the money of Afghans."
Afghan activist group, Afghans For A Better Tomorrow, condemned US President Joe Biden's decision.
"President Biden's decision to set aside half of Afghanistan's frozen reserves to 9/11 families is short-sighted, cruel, and will worsen a catastrophe in progress, affecting millions of Afghans, many of whom are on the verge of starvation," the group said in a statement.
The group urged the US to partially unfreeze the assets immediately, allowing the Central Bank of Afghanistan to restore liquidity into the Afghan economy.
"Let us be clear: all of the $7.1 billion in reserves belongs, rightfully, to the people of Afghanistan and ought to be used to allow the Central Bank of Afghanistan to perform its basic functions."
Refugees International issued a statement saying they are concerned the US administration's proposal will exacerbate the suffering of the Afghan people.
"Millions are already facing a dire and life-threatening humanitarian crisis this winter," the organisation said.
"Using part of Afghanistan’s reserves to help provide badly needed relief aid and essential services will no doubt help save lives.
"But we are concerned that this action could further cripple the country’s financial system and thereby perpetuate the suffering of the Afghan people."
The organisation said the US administration should be taking measures "to ensure that the maintenance of banking and payments systems independent of Taliban control and should have leveraged the funds in the Federal Reserve to achieve that outcome.”
Mohsin Amin, Policy Analyst and Researcher from Afghanistan, also criticised the move.
Children beg for alms from commuters on the street in Kabul, Afghanistan. Source: Getty Images/AFP
"The US dropped 85,000 bombs on Afghanistan. Even if one bomb killed 3 people, it's 255K. The last US airstrike killed 10 (7 children)," he tweeted.
"97 per cent of [Afghanistan] is starving, 3.2m children are malnourished, yet the US wants to throttle the economy and steal the hard-earned savings of Afghans."
Shabnam Nasimi, Policy Advisor to the UK Minister of Afghan Resettlement, said the decision was "unjust and immoral."
"As more than 23 million people are on the brink of starvation, it is unjust & immoral for @POTUS to want to use billions of Afghanistan’s frozen assets to pay 9/11 victims," she tweeted.
"The horrific 9/11 attacks had nothing to do with the people of Afghanistan, & they should not be punished."
Adam Weinstein, researcher at the Quincy Institute, said the move will "go down in history as a travesty."
"Punishing an entire people for a crime they did not commit & kneecapping them into forever dependence should offend every American," he tweeted.
The central bank funds have been frozen since the Taliban took over the country as foreign forces withdrew in August.
The frozen funding combined with sanctions and a drop off in development funding has sent the country's economy into freefall, unleashing a humanitarian crisis.
Da Afghanistan Bank (DAB) said its assets had been invested in the United States in line with international practices, and belonged to the people of Afghanistan.
"DAB considers the latest decision of USA on blocking FX (foreign exchange) reserves and allocating them to irrelevant purposes, injustice to the people of Afghanistan," the central bank said in a statement.
"(DAB) will never accept if the FX reserves of Afghanistan is paid under the name of compensation or humanitarian assistance to others and wants the reversal of the decision and release of all FX reserves of Afghanistan," it added.
The spokesman of the Taliban’s Doha office has blasted the US proposal, tweeting: "Stealing and takeover of frozen money which belongs to the Afghan people by the US shows the lowest level of human and moral decline of a country."
The plans also prompted an angry response from some families of September 11 victims, who are seeking to cover unsatisfied court judgments related to the attacks that killed nearly 3,000 people.
Brett Eagleson, the son of one victim, said the US government should ensure the equal treatment of all family members of those killed by ordering the $3.5 billion to be distributed via an existing fund, instead of leaving it up to the court to potentially favor a small subset of families.
"Any mechanism that treats some victims’ families as less deserving or that prioritizes some victims over others is an insult to the memories of those victims of this mass murder," he said.
Additional reporting by Reuters
