Pakistan asks US to unfreeze complete assets of Afghanistan

Islamabad: Pakistan has called for the complete unfreezing of Afghanistan's assets after the Joe Biden-led administration decided to keep half of the $7 billion Afghan assets in the country.

Foreign Office spokesperson Asim Iftikhar in a statement on Saturday said Pakistan had seen the US decision to release $3.5 billion for humanitarian assistance in Afghanistan and $3.5 billion for compensation to families of 9/11 victims.

"Over the past several months, Pakistan has been consistently emphasising the need for international community to quickly act to address the unfolding humanitarian catastrophe in Afghanistan and to help revive the Afghan economy, as the two are inextricably linked," the spokesperson said.

Iftikhar added that finding ways to unfreeze the Afghan foreign reserves urgently would help address the humanitarian and economic needs of the Afghan people.

He said Islamabad's principled position on the frozen Afghan foreign bank reserves remains that these are owned by the Afghan nation and these should be released.

"The utilisation of Afghan funds should be the sovereign decision of Afghanistan," he said.

The spokesperson highlighted that the Afghan people are facing grave economic and humanitarian challenges and the international community must continue to play its important and constructive role in alleviating their sufferings. "Time is of the essence."

The multi-step plan to release funds calls for half of the funds to remain in the United States, subject to ongoing litigation by US victims of terrorism, including relatives of those who died in the September 11, 2001, hijacking attacks, the officials said.

Senior US administration officials said they would work to ensure access to $3.5 billion of the assets — which stem mainly from aid to Afghanistan over the past two decades — to benefit the Afghan people.

They said Washington would set up a third-party trust to administer the funds for which details were still being worked out.

On Friday, president Jo Biden had signed an executive order to deal with the threat of an economic collapse in Afghanistan, setting wheels in motion for a complex resolution of competing interests in the country's assets.

The United States is seeking to free up half of the $7 billion in frozen Afghan central bank assets on US soil to help the Afghan people while holding the rest to possibly satisfy terrorism-related lawsuits against the Taliban, the White House said.