The UN's humanitarian chief Martin Griffiths called on donors to restore funding for economic development and immediately provide $770 million to help Afghans pull through the winter.
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Martin Griffiths told the UN Security Council on Monday that Afghanistan faced deepening poverty, with six million people at risk of famine, due to humanitarian, economic, climate and financial crises.
Conflict, poverty, climate shocks and food insecurity “have long been a sad reality†in Afghanistan, but he said what made the current situation “so critical†was the halt to large-scale development aid since the Taliban took over a year ago.
More than half the country's population — about 24 million people — need assistance and close to 19 million are facing acute levels of food insecurity, Mr Griffiths said.
He said there were concerns that the figures would soon become worse due to winter, which is expected to drive up already high fuel and food prices.
Despite the challenges, he said UN agencies and their NGO partners had mounted “an unprecedented response†over the past year, reaching about 23 million people.
But he said $614 million was urgently required to prepare for winter, including money to repair and upgrade shelters, as well as provide warm clothes and blankets.
An additional $154 million is needed to secure food and other supplies before the weather cuts access to certain areas.
However, Mr Griffiths said humanitarian aid would “never be able to replace the provision of system-wide services to 40 million people across the countryâ€.
The Taliban “have no budget to invest in their own future,†he said, and “it’s clear that some development support needs to be startedâ€.
With more than 70 per cent of Afghan’s living in rural areas, Mr Griffiths said millions of lives and livelihoods would be at risk and the country’s capacity to produce food imperilled if agriculture and livestock production are not protected.
The country’s banking and liquidity crisis, and the extreme difficulty of international financial transactions must also be tackled, he said.
“The consequences of inaction on both the humanitarian and development fronts will be catastrophic and difficult to reverse,†Mr Griffiths warned.
Russia called the UN Security Council meeting on the eve of the first anniversary of the US withdrawal from Afghanistan and its ambassador, Vassily Nebenzia, sharply criticised the “ignominious 20-year campaign†by the US and its Nato allies.
He claimed they did nothing to build up the Afghan economy and said their presence only strengthened the country’s status “as a hotbed of terrorism†and narcotics production and distribution.
Mr Nebenzia also accused the US and its allies of abandoning Afghans to face “ruin, poverty, terrorism, hunger and other challengesâ€.
“Instead of acknowledging their own mistakes and supporting the reconstruction of the destroyed country,†he said, they blocked Afghan financial resources and disconnected its central bank from Swift, the dominant system for global financial transactions.
The U.S. was the world’s leading donor in Afghanistan, providing more than $775 million in humanitarian aid to Afghans in the country and the region over the past year.
US ambassador Linda Thomas-Greenfield accused the Taliban of imposing policies that “repress and starve the Afghan people, instead of protecting themâ€, and of increasing taxes on critically needed assistance. ■