Tell Biden officials: Unfreeze Afghanistan’s reserves and save millions of innocent Afghans!
Biden administration (Nat Sec Advisor Sullivan & Dep. Treasury Secretary Adeyemo)
Afghanistan is facing a crisis of unparalleled proportions. As a consequence of punishing U.S. sanctions including a freeze on nearly $10 billion in Afghanistan’s Central Bank reserves, more Afghan civilians could die now than during the past 20 years of war. As Norwegian Refugee Council chief Jan Egeland explained, “It is now, paradoxically, the Western sanctions that are our main problem in saving lives in Afghanistan.”
With Afghanistan out of the news and the media’s attention focused largely on promoting U.S. involvement in the war in Ukraine, Just Foreign Policy is doing everything it can to keep the attention on the fact that due to U.S. policy, 95 percent of Afghans do not have enough food.
That is why Just Foreign Policy partnered with the Gravel Institute and Unfreeze Afghanistan’s Masuda Sultan to produce a new 10-minute mini-documentary explaining how “U.S. policy could be causing a crisis far worse than anything the Taliban has done” to innocent Afghans. But we need your help to break through the mainstream media blackout on this urgent catastrophe.
What you can do now:
Watch the new Just Foreign Policy/Gravel Institute video on Afghanistan sanctions here
Sign our petition to the Biden admin officials causing this crisis
By confiscating nearly $10 billion of the Afghan people’s money, the U.S. government is causing the single most devastating year in Afghanistan’s recorded history, already one of the world’s poorest countries. Lifting U.S. sanctions and releasing the Central Bank’s funds would rescue the economy from economic freefall and allow families to once again withdraw their own money to buy food, medicine, and firewood for their children.
But with the crisis in Ukraine dominating the news, we need you to help focus attention on this unprecedented crisis. Here’s what you can do:
WATCH our video with the Gravel Institute on Afghanistan’s crisis.
SIGN the petition calling on the National Security Adviser Jake Sullivan and Deputy Secretary Adeyemo to end these brutal sanctions. We will deliver the petition to them directly.
SHARE the petition and mini-documentary on Twitter.
Thank you for all you do to make U.S. foreign policy more just!
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As a consequence of punishing U.S. sanctions including a freeze on nearly $10 billion in Afghanistan’s Central Bank reserves, more Afghan civilians could die now than during the past 20 years of war. As Norwegian Refugee Council chief Jan Egeland explained, “It is now, paradoxically, the Western sanctions that are our main problem in saving lives in Afghanistan.”
Top U.N. officials warn that, “We are in a race against time to help the Afghan people,” as U.S. sanctions contribute to an unprecedented humanitarian catastrophe and acute poverty affecting “virtually every man, woman and child in Afghanistan.”
Media outlets including the NYT editorial board, Washington Post, MSNBC, and Vox urge the release of Afghanistan’s frozen reserves held abroad. Without reinjecting liquidity into the Afghan economy, the NYT warns "[m]illions of Afghans could run out of food before the arrival of winter and one million children are at risk of starvation and death if their immediate needs are not met."
The impending death toll from hunger in Afghanistan this winter “would dwarf the total number of Afghan civilians estimated to have been killed as a direct result of the war over the past 20 years.”
We urge President Biden, National Security Adviser Jake Sullivan and Deputy Treasury Secretary Adeyemo to unfreeze the entirety of the Afghan people’s bank reserves to ensure that millions of innocent Afghans do not die as a result of this deeply misguided U.S. policy.