People wait to receive aid provided by a charity on the outskirts of Kabul, Afghanistan, on January 30, 2022.
WAKIL KOHSAR / AFP VIA GETTY IMAGES
PUBLISHED February 12, 2022
As U.S. Rep. Ilhan Omar on Friday led condemnation of a reported Biden administration plan to permanently seize $7 billion of currently frozen Afghan assets and distribute half to relatives of 9/11 victims, advocates pointed to the worsening humanitarian crisis in Afghanistan and urged President Joe Biden to change course.
Noting that “there wasn’t a single Afghan” among the 9/11 hijackers — and the U.S. gives billions of dollars to the Saudi and Egyptian governments despite their “direct ties to the 9/11 terrorists” — Omar (D-Minn.) tweeted that punishing millions of starving people is “unconscionable.”
Omar said she agrees with Barry Amundson — a member of 9/11 Families for Peaceful Tomorrows who lost his brother in the Pentagon attack — who warned the proposed seizure would “cause further harm to innocent Afghans.”
“That’s exactly what will happen,” Omar tweeted.
As U.S. Rep. Ilhan Omar on Friday led condemnation of a reported Biden administration plan to permanently seize $7 billion of currently frozen Afghan assets and distribute half to relatives of 9/11 victims, advocates pointed to the worsening humanitarian crisis in Afghanistan and urged President Joe Biden to change course.
Noting that “there wasn’t a single Afghan” among the 9/11 hijackers — and the U.S. gives billions of dollars to the Saudi and Egyptian governments despite their “direct ties to the 9/11 terrorists” — Omar (D-Minn.) tweeted that punishing millions of starving people is “unconscionable.”
Omar said she agrees with Barry Amundson — a member of 9/11 Families for Peaceful Tomorrows who lost his brother in the Pentagon attack — who warned the proposed seizure would “cause further harm to innocent Afghans.”
“That’s exactly what will happen,” Omar tweeted.
Khaled Beydoun, an Egyptian-American scholar, tweeted: “This is theft. Graft. Amid famine, no less.”
“Newsflash: Zero of the 9/11 terrorists were Afghan,” he added. “This is absurd.”
The advocacy group Afghans for A Better Tomorrow said in a statement that the proposed redistribution of Afghan funds “is short-sighted, cruel, and will worsen a catastrophe in progress, affecting millions of Afghans, many of whom are on the verge of starvation.”
“Taking money which rightfully belongs to the Afghan people will not bring justice but ensure more misery and death in Afghanistan,” the group — which is circulating a petition aimed at convincing the administration to immediately unfreeze some of the funds — asserted.
“Newsflash: Zero of the 9/11 terrorists were Afghan,” he added. “This is absurd.”
The advocacy group Afghans for A Better Tomorrow said in a statement that the proposed redistribution of Afghan funds “is short-sighted, cruel, and will worsen a catastrophe in progress, affecting millions of Afghans, many of whom are on the verge of starvation.”
“Taking money which rightfully belongs to the Afghan people will not bring justice but ensure more misery and death in Afghanistan,” the group — which is circulating a petition aimed at convincing the administration to immediately unfreeze some of the funds — asserted.
Phyllis Rodriguez, whose son died in the 9/11 attack on the World Trade Center in New York City and who is also with Peaceful Tomorrows, was among those urging Biden to reject the proposed policy.
“President Biden has the opportunity to make amends right now! He can unfreeze the funds belonging to the Afghan people,” she said. “They are not the Taliban’s property but of everyday folks like us. Let’s see this as a humanitarian crisis that we can address immediately.”
Others noted the dire conditions the Afghan people are currently enduring.
Masuda Sultan, an Afghan-American author and activist with Unfreeze Afghanistan, said that Afghans are “experiencing a historic famine within a pandemic, and their economy has been in a freefall worse than the Great Depression.”
“One of the main drivers of the economic collapse is the freezing of their assets,” she added. “If the funds are not returned and the famine is not averted, America will be blamed for one of the worst famines in history.”
Others noted the dire conditions the Afghan people are currently enduring.
Masuda Sultan, an Afghan-American author and activist with Unfreeze Afghanistan, said that Afghans are “experiencing a historic famine within a pandemic, and their economy has been in a freefall worse than the Great Depression.”
“One of the main drivers of the economic collapse is the freezing of their assets,” she added. “If the funds are not returned and the famine is not averted, America will be blamed for one of the worst famines in history.”
Rodriguez said that “it saddens me that there are 9/11 family members who can’t see the discrepancies in our relative privilege to demand reparations instead of recognizing the dire need of Afghans.”
“They have suffered unjustly for the actions of a cadre of extremists — a tiny minority of the population,” she continued. “Major famine, disease, displacement, and destruction that our government and its allies created should be reversed through all means possible.”
Medea Benjamin, co-founder of the women-led peace group CodePink, said in a statement that “taking funds that rightfully belong to some of the poorest people in the world who are now facing a catastrophic famine is a cruel move that will not bring justice to the 9/11 families.”
Referencing the U.S. occupation that Biden ended last year as the Taliban retook the country, Benjamin tweeted that taking “billions of dollars away from starving Afghans” would be “a fitting end to 20 years of screwing the Afghan people.”
“They have suffered unjustly for the actions of a cadre of extremists — a tiny minority of the population,” she continued. “Major famine, disease, displacement, and destruction that our government and its allies created should be reversed through all means possible.”
Medea Benjamin, co-founder of the women-led peace group CodePink, said in a statement that “taking funds that rightfully belong to some of the poorest people in the world who are now facing a catastrophic famine is a cruel move that will not bring justice to the 9/11 families.”
Referencing the U.S. occupation that Biden ended last year as the Taliban retook the country, Benjamin tweeted that taking “billions of dollars away from starving Afghans” would be “a fitting end to 20 years of screwing the Afghan people.”
‘USA Stole Money From Afghans’: People Take to Streets of Kabul to Protest US Asset Seizure
© Photo : Twitter / @Shamshadnetwork
Joe Biden signed an executive order Friday allowing for $7 billion in Afghan Central Bank funds in the US to be split in two into a ‘humanitarian trust’ and a fund to pay victims of the 9/11 terror attacks. Afghanistan is the latest nation to fall victim to the US policy of asset pilfering, with Iran and Venezuela previously robbed of billions.
A small group of demonstrators took the streets of Kabul on Saturday to protest Washington’s “illegal” seizure of $7 billion in cash which the previous government had stashed in US banks before Afghanistan was overrun by the Taliban* last summer.
Protesters gathered before the Grand Id Gah Mosque with makeshift cardboard signs, some of them in illegible English, reading “USA stole money from Afghans”, “America is cruel” and “America should give us one million [illegible] people damage.”
In addition to slamming Biden’s decision to use $3.5 billion in Afghan assets for payments to families of American 9/11 victims, protesters demanded financial compensation for the tens of thousands of Afghans who died during the 19+ year war and occupation of their country.
“What about our Afghan people who gave many sacrifices and thousands of losses of lives?” protest organizer Abdul Rahman asked. "This money belongs to the people of Afghanistan, not to the United States. This is the right of Afghans," he said.
Torek Farhadi, a former financial advisor to the US-backed government, told reporters that Biden’s order was illegal.
“These reserves belong to the people of Afghanistan, not the Taliban…Biden’s decision is one-sided and does not match with international law,” he said. "No other country on Earth makes such confiscation decisions about another country's reserves," he added.
The vast majority of Afghanistan’s overseas assets abroad have been stuck in limbo in US banks ever since the NATO-backed government’s collapse last August. Along with $7 billion in the US, another $2 billion is stashed in Germany, Switzerland and the United Arab Emirates.
The Taliban blasted the Biden administration over the "theft" of Afghan assets on Friday, calling his decision a "showcase of the human and moral decline of the country and people."
Washington has promised that $3.5 billion of the $7 billion will be put into a humanitarian trust which will be used to aid the Afghan people. The rest of the money will remain in the US, pending court rulings on legal claims against the Taliban by the families of victims of the 11 September 2001 terror attacks.
The United States holds the Taliban partially responsible for the 9/11 attacks, citing the group's decision to provide refuge to al-Qaeda* commander and terror mastermind Osama bin Laden. The Taliban's refusal to hand him over to US authorities served as a pretext for the US invasion of Afghanistan in 2001. The Taliban maintain to this day that US officials have yet to show them evidence that bin Laden was responsible for 9/11.
US courts have not shied away from seizing assets even of countries which had absolutely nothing to do with 9/11 to pay compensation for the attacks. In 2018, a New York court ordered $6 billion in Iranian assets frozen in US banks to be redistributed to 9/11 victims' families, even though none of the 19 terrorist hijackers were Iranians, and despite Iran's record of battling al-Qaeda, the Taliban and other jihadist groups.
*The Taliban is an organization under UN sanctions for terrorist activities.
*A terrorist group outlawed in Russia and many other countries.
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