The Chinese Foreign Ministry Spokesperson Wang Wenbin made the remarks in his regular press conference on August 12 and in response to the media's question, "According to reports, more than 70 economists and experts from other fields recently wrote to US President Biden and Treasury Secretary Yellen, criticizing the US government’s executive order that divided the $7 billion of frozen assets of the Afghan central bank into two and calling on the government to immediately return the assets in full. This open letter was published by the Center for Economic and Policy Research and co-signed by Nobel Laureate for Economics Joseph Stiglitz as well as other global scholars. What is China’s comment on that?"
The Chinese foreign ministry spokesman responded, “I have noted that this open letter pointed out that the US government’s decision to seize Afghanistan’s $7 billion foreign exchange reserves “contributed mightily to Afghanistan’s economic collapse”. The US government’s “decision to divide these funds in two is arbitrary and unjustified” and “undermines the recovery” of the Afghan economy."
Wenbib added, "I also noted that it has been almost one year since the US withdrew its troops from Afghanistan. Critics around the world have argued that the US still hasn’t stopped doing harm to the Afghan people. If anything, it has been aggravated. UN Secretary-General Antonio Guterres warned that millions of Afghans are on the “verge of death”. An official of the World Food Program pointed out at 98% of Afghans are facing food insecurity and nearly half of the Afghan children under the age of five suffer from acute malnutrition."
He further said, “Nearly 20 years of “forced transformation” imposed by the US on Afghanistan have not only failed to lift the Afghan people out of poverty and turbulence but also worsened the crisis of human survival and national development. This is yet another textbook example of how US democracy destabilizes the world. Although US troops have left Afghanistan, the crimes done against the country still persist. Unless the US stops harming the Afghan people, their ordeal will not end.”
“We urge the US to own up to its wrongdoing and take real action to heal Afghan people’s trauma, and show accountability to the world,” Wenbin added.
AY/PR
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