The United States Department of State has informed of providing nearly $327 million in additional humanitarian assistance to help the people of Afghanistan.
This funding includes nearly $119 million through the Department of State’s Bureau of Population, Refugees, and Migration and nearly $208 million through the U.S. United State Agency for International Development’s (USAID) Bureau for Humanitarian Assistance, bringing the total U.S. humanitarian assistance in Afghanistan and neighboring countries to more than $1.1 billion since the Islamic Emirate takeover one year ago in August 2021.
According to a statement released by the U.S. Department of State, the United States remains committed to the Afghan people and continues to call on other members of the international community to adhere to pledges made during the March 31 High-Level Pledging Event on Supporting the Humanitarian Response in Afghanistan.
Although the people of Afghanistan welcome the U.S. recent additional humanitarian assistance to Afghanistan, they say the aid is not sufficient.
Due to years of war and continued drought resulting in stopping all economic activities in Afghanistan, the people are facing with shortage of foodstuffs; therefore, they need more urgent aid from the international community.
“We are thinking of coming winter and we do not know how to live with our family in this open environment,” said Ahmad Zia, a miserable resident of Kabul. Ahmad Zia like other miserable families living under tents are asking the United Nations for shelter and food so that they can deal with the cold weather of the coming winter.
The United Nations and other humanitarian organizations as the World Food Program have repeatedly warned of humanitarian crisis in Afghanistan and asked for urgent humanitarian assistance to more than half of the country’s population.
Meanwhile, the World Food Program chief David Beasley said the United States contributed an additional $5 billion for food security, and Germany, France and the European Union are also stepping up. But he called on Gulf States to “step up more” with oil prices so high, particularly to help countries in their region like Yemen, Syria, Afghanistan and Somalia.
“We’re not talking about asking for a trillion dollars here,” Beasley said. “We’re just talking about asking for a few days’ worth of your profits to stabilize the world,” he said.
The WFP chief said he also met with a group of billionaires on Wednesday night. He said he told them they had “a moral obligation” and “need to care.”
Afghan economists say that today the people of Afghanistan are in a bad economic situation, asking the international community to provide further urgent assistance to the miserable people as they are poor and on the other hand, continued drought and recent floods have caused increasing poverty in Afghanistan.
Shukria Kohistani
Afghans welcomes U.S. additional humanitarian assistance to Afghanistan
