‘Afghanistan’s most urgent need is cash’
AFGHANISTAN is facing a looming humanitarian crisis as aid organisations struggle to pay doctors, nurses and others on the ground because there is no way to transfer salaries to bank accounts there, the head of the International Committee of the Red Cross said.
ICRC president Peter Maurer’s comments echo those of the UN’s special representative for Afghanistan, who warned this week that the country is “on the brink of a humanitarian catastrophe” and that its collapsing economy is heightening the risk of extremism.
The country’s economy is estimated to have contracted by 40% since the Taliban took control in August.
The ICRC, which has operated in Afghanistan for more than 30 years, is temporarily carrying in bags of cash to the impoverished nation and converting dollars into the local currency, the afghani, in order to pay some of its staff.
The Geneva-based group has been able to do this with regulatory approval by the US Treasury Department’s Office of Foreign Assets Control.
The ICRC also has an agreement with the Taliban-run Health Ministry that allows donor-funded payments to pass through the ICRC and bypass the Taliban, which has yet to be officially recognised internationally by any nation.
ICRC president Peter Maurer told the Associated Press in an interview: “The main problem in Afghanistan is not hunger.
“The main problem is the lack of cash to pay salaries to deliver social services which have existed before.
“Let’s not forget that most of these medical doctors, nurses, operators of water systems and electricity systems are still the same people. It is the leadership which has changed, but not these people,” he added.
Afghanistan’s aid-reliant economy was thrown into turmoil following the Taliban takeover of the capital, Kabul, in August and the collapse of the USbacked Afghan government weeks before the US withdrew its last troops.