Russian Foreign Ministry slams U.S. decision to block Afghan Central Bank's assets

MOSCOW. Feb 14 (Interfax) - The U.S. authorities' decision to freeze $7 billion in assets belonging to the Afghan Central Bank will put a further strain on the humanitarian situation in Afghanistan and calls into question the sincerity of Washington's statements that it is willing to help stabilize the situation in the country, the Russian Foreign Ministry said on Monday.

"U.S. President Joe Biden's order freezing $7 billion in assets owned by the Central Bank of Afghanistan and held in the U.S. evokes questions about the sincerity of the White House's statements that it wants to help stabilize the situation in this country," Russian Foreign Ministry spokesperson Maria Zakharova said in a commentary published on the ministry's website.

"In conditions of the extremely grave humanitarian situation caused, among other factors, by the failed military campaign of the U.S. and its NATO allies, Washington is effectively exacerbating the humanitarian crisis in Afghanistan and is hindering the new authorities in Kabul, which are trying to bring life back to normal," according to the statement.

The Foreign Ministry also described as "absurd Washington's plans to free up more than half of the Afghan Central Bank's frozen assets to pay compensation to relatives of the victims of the September 11, 2001 terrorist acts."

"Why should the Afghan people, who had nothing to do with organizing those terrorist acts, pay for them now? Whereas the American administration's statement that it reserves the right to decide to extend aid to the Afghans using $3.5 billion out of the money which already belongs to the Afghan people is nothing other than a mockery of common sense," the ministry said.