Feb 12, 2022: In a statement on Saturday, Pakistan’s foreign ministry said the country’s principled position on frozen Afghan foreign bank deposits was that they belonged to the Afghan nation and should be released.

“The use of Afghan funds should be an independent decision of Afghanistan,” it said in a statement. The reaction came as Biden announced that he would keep half of Afghanistan’s $7 billion in foreign assets for the victims of the 9/11 attacks and release the rest for humanitarian aid to Afghanistan.

The decision was also criticized in the United States, with many, including the families of 9/11 victims, insisting that Afghan funds should not be used arbitrarily by the US government.

According to a statement by the Pakistan Foreign Office, “Pakistan has seen the US decision to unfreeze the Afghan assets held by the US banks to release $3.5 billion for humanitarian assistance in Afghanistan and $3.5 billion for compensation to families of 9/11 victims,”

“Finding ways to unfreeze the Afghan foreign reserves urgently would help address the humanitarian and economic needs of the Afghan people.”

It said Pakistan’s principled position on the frozen reserves of the Afghan Foreign Bank was that the use of Afghan funds should be an independent decision of Afghanistan.

The statement also called attention to the Afghan people, who are facing serious economic and humanitarian challenges, and the international community must continue to play its important and constructive role in alleviating their suffering. “Time is of the essence,” the statement concluded.

The Afghan Taliban also immediately condemned the US decision.

Mohammad Naeem, the spokesman for the Taliban’s political office in Doha, said in a tweet, “Stealing the Afghan people’s money that was frozen by the United States is the lowest a country could stoop to morally and humanly. Defeat and victory are part of human history but the greatest and scandalous defeat for a country or its people is when they suffer militarily and morally as well.”

The country’s funds deposited in the Federal Reserve Bank of New York were frozen since the Taliban takeover in late August 2021, following the fall of then-President Ashraf Ghani’s government. Since then, the country has faced economic catastrophe and food insecurity.

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