A massive job crisis that threatens to grow further, lack of food and medicines and frozen overseas assets prompted today’s press conference.
Afghanistan’s acting prime minister, Mullah Mohammad Hassan Akhund, today pleaded the international community to recognize his administration. He was speaking at a press conference called to convey his message to governments across the world for recognizing the Taliban government.
A financial crisis, together with soaring inflation, unemployment, and cash shortages is impacting access to food, water, shelter, and health care.
The acting prime minister said that the country is presently passing through a humanitarian crisis. Millions of people have been pushed into poverty and there is a shortage of food while people have no means to keep themselves warm in the middle of the freezing Afghan winter.
“I ask all governments, especially Islamic countries, that they should start recognition,” Radio Azadi, a radio run by Afghan journalists in exile quoted him as saying. He assured that the Taliban government he heads has restored peace and security.
Poverty has been aggravated by joblessness. The International Labour Organisation (ILO) predicts that 900,000 people might lose their livelihoods by mid-2022.
“Economic recovery and a return to stability in the labor market is largely contingent upon the continued support of the international community, which at this point remains unclear, as well as policy decisions of the new administration,” the ILO report said.
Already, over half a million people in the country are jobless. International humanitarian organisations have spoken of how 22 million people are resorting to negative coping mechanisms this winter by burning their clothes and furniture in order to keep themselves warm.
Mullah Mohammad Hassan Akhund also called for the unfreezing of Afghanistan’s assets held overseas. He was referring to the United States and other western nations freezing billions of dollars worth of Afghan banking assets, besides cutting off development funding to the war-torn nation.
The prime minister’s pleas for official recognition are significant, since the present Taliban rulers have been accused of serious violations of human rights, particularly of women and the country’s ethnic minorities.
So far, no country has recognized the country’s new rulers, though Russia, China, Iran and Pakistan are sizing up the situation after they seized power in 2021.
Even during their earlier stint in power between 1996 and 2001, only three widely recognized countries – Pakistan, Saudi Arabia, and the United Arab Emirates (UAE) declared the Islamic Emirate to be Afghanistan’s rightful government.
According to Mansoor Ahmed, Pakistan’s ambassador to Afghanistan, the banking system in Afghanistan is not operating and this is adding to the problems of the new Afghan government.
Earlier this month, Pakistan had called a meeting of foreign ministers of the Organisation of Islamic Countries to discuss Afghan issues and to engage the world community to support the Afghan government.
Image: Children use the heat from a firewood stove to keep themselves warm in the hard Afghan winter.
Credit: Sayed Bidel / UNICEF
