JALALABAD, Feb 23 (NNN-ANA) – Scores of disabled persons staged a protest in Jalalabad, capital of Afghanistan’s eastern Nangarhar Province yesterday, urging the United States to return Afghan assets.
The protesters described the freeze of Afghanistan’s assets in U.S. banks, or giving them as compensation to the families of the 9/11 terrorist attacks as unjust, saying, Washington should return the assets to Afghanistan.
The United States, following military defeat and complete withdrawal of forces from Afghanistan in Aug last year, has frozen nearly 10 billion U.S. dollars’ assets of Afghanistan’s central bank, leading to worsening economic problems and poverty in the war-torn country.
U.S. President, Joe Biden, reportedly in a decree issued on Feb 11, allocated 3.5 billion U.S. dollars of the sum, to the families of the victims of the 9/11 terrorist attacks and diverted 3.5 billion U.S. dollars to the Afghans, as humanitarian aid, without consent of the Afghan administration run by the Taliban.
The disabled union’s chief, Masoud Safi said, in his speech during the protest, “No Afghan was involved in the Sept 11, 2001, terrorist attacks on America and therefore allocating Afghanistan’s assets to the families of the terror attacks victims is unfair.”
Afghans, by holding similar protests in different cities over the past week, have demanded the release and return of the assets to Afghanistan.– NNN-ANA
