KABUL: Afghan businessman Shoaib Barak struggled to pay for his workers and suppliers, unable to access funds from the paralyzed banking system by freezing assets abroad.
They, in turn, cannot pay their bills – and therefore economic misery drips and hurts everyone along the unbroken misery chain.
“I feel very embarrassed,” Barak said, who until now employs around 200 people throughout the country – mostly in the construction business.
“For me, for every Afghanistan, it’s really disgusting.
I don’t even have the ability to pay a salary for my staff.” To avoid giving Taliban access to Afghan reserves, Washington freezes the estimated $ 10 billion held by the central bank abroad after the Hardline Islamists seize power on August 15.
Equating about half of the country’s economy last year, which moves in turn of hunger banks.
used by Afghan businesses and residents access to the dollar.
Even if limited funds are released, bulk can be bound in the American legal system for years while claimed by the victims of the al-Qaeda attack on September 11, 2001 in the US.
Usually, reserves can be dipped into paying bills and government development projects that have passed time, but freezing has dripped throughout the economy.
“Remove the backup,” barracks begged.
“If you have a problem with …
Taliban, don’t revenge the nation, people.” The crisis of the barrack cash flow illustrates the problems faced by tens of thousands of Afghans who cannot access most of their money.
He said he had around $ 3 million tied at Afghan banks – the money obtained over the years from a profitable private and government contract, which was paid in dollars as aid poured into public wallets under the Pre-Taliban regime.
But with local banks that limit weekly withdrawals to five percent of the balance of business accounts – up to a maximum of $ 5,000 – months behind on invoices and salaries to their staff.
Ahmad Zia is one of them.
The 55-year-old engineer produced 60,000 Afghanistan per month – equivalent to $ 770 before the Taliban took over and the currency fell 25 percent.
Four months later, Zia struggled to meet the needs and fear of his family who used to be from six will only “eat one or two times” per day.
It’s not just a barrack employee who suffers.
Ehsanullah Maroof’s law business is now very dependent on the monthly followers of the barracks construction company.
“Children go to excellent school,” he told AFP, noticing proudly that his nine-year-old daughter was taking his year.
But now he is unable to buy the right medicine for an epilepsy son, and the shutter has been issued because the family cannot pay school fees.
The misery dripped further – for Maroh’s family servants, who are now unemployed.
Gulha, 42, produced 8,000 Afghanistan a month and was the main breadwinner in a strong seven family.
Now he is two months behind rent and running out of food.
“I have 14 kilograms (30 pounds) of rice, 20-21 kilograms of flour and some oil,” he told AFP in a one-room apartment where he allowed neighbors to share the warmth of the night of Wood-descends when winter dropped.
“This will last 10 days.” After that, he will join millions of compatriots who really depend on help.
The UN Security Council on Wednesday unanimously adopted the US resolution to help humanitarian assistance reaching Afghanistan desperately while trying to maintain funds from Taliban Hands – steps greeted by Islamists as “good steps”.
But whether cash is enough to resist the ongoing humanitarian disaster in the event that it still depends on the “feasibility of the banking system”, said Hanna Luchnikava-Schorsch, the Pacific Principal at IHS Markit.
Many Afghan banks “quite close to the collapse”, he told AFP, and foreign institutions might be “scared” because of the fall in sanctions despite the resolution of the United Nations.
For many ordinary Afghans, every relief will come late.
International organizations warn one million Afghan children can die this winter, barn records.
“Who do you think to be blamed – Taliban, or the US?”
Trickle-down Misery: How Afghan Assets Freeze to hurt everyone
