By Chioma Iruke
President Joe Biden’s United State of America has frozen assets worth nearly $9.5 billion belonging to ‘Da Afghanistan Bank’ as well as blocked cash from being shipped to the war-torn nation, in a bid to prevent the Taliban from accessing the money, an official familiar with the development has said.
The move followed a decision by the US Treasury Secretary, Janet L Yellen and officials in the Treasury Department’s Office of Foreign Assets Control on Sunday, when it ordered to freeze Afghan government reserves held in US banks.
As a result of this action, the Taliban, which remains on the list of ‘Specially Designated Nationals’, facing financial sanctions, would not be able to access any Afghan Central Bank assets kept in the US, according to The Washington Post.
Ajmal Ahmadi, the Acting Governor of Afghanistan’s Central Bank, took to Twitter to post that he came to know about remittances being stopped by the US to prevent the Taliban from gaining access to the money.
The US government didn’t need any fresh authority to freeze Afghan monetary reserves, as the country’s government fell to the Taliban, which continued to face financial sanctions in the aftermath of the 9/11 attack.
