US President Joe Biden signed an executive order freeing up $7 billion in frozen Afghan assets in the US, splitting it between humanitarian aid for the distressed country and a fund for the September 11 attack’s victims in the US— a long delayed move that united Afghans across the political spectrum in protesting against what they see as plundering of the money that belongs to common Afghans. 

The order signed on Friday calls for banks to release $3.5 billion of the frozen money to a trust fund for distribution through humanitarian groups for Afghan relief and basic needs. The rest, $3.5 billion, would remain in the US, and will be utilized later in compensating the victims of the 9/11 attack. 

The order, if implemented, would dash any hope still left for reviving the Afghan central bank, known as Da Afghan Bank (DAB), an institution the US itself helped create in the last two decades, and which became the bedrock of the country’s economy.  

In August last year, the Biden administration rescinded the access of the DAB to the national reserves kept in the US bank, after the Taliban seized power in a violent takeover. The Taliban’s efforts in freeing up the fund seem to be ending in vain. 

Several Afghans took to Twitter, expressing their displeasure over the move. #Wedidn’tcommit9/11 was the most popular trend, where people— including those reluctant to the Taliban, gaining access to the fund—expressed their anguish. 

Although half of the fund has been set aside for humanitarian assistance, it will unlikely support the struggling economy which is gasping for immediate liquidity injection. Afghan analysts also seem united in the view: the move spells doom for the country’s private sector. 

The reserves that Biden plans to liquidate include the millions of dollars in savings that common Afghans had put in banks.

Never in recent history was the Afghans’ trust in the banking system broken this badly—a fear that would keep the population away from banks for decades to come, making the economic revival even tougher.

None of the fifteen attackers who took part in the 9/11 attack were Afghan. For many, the move felt like punishing a desperate population for the a crime they had had no control over. Having faced an ignominious military defeat and retreat last year, President Joe Biden’s latest move appears a final act of revenge, once again, against the wrong enemy: ordinary Afghans.  

(SAM)