Martin Griffiths, the UN's head of humanitarian affairs, said that "the need for liquidity and stabilisation of the banking system is now urgent -- not only to save the lives of the Afghan people but also to enable humanitarian organizations to respond."
According
to report, China, backed by Russia, blocked a US draft resolution Monday in the
UN Security Council that would have provided a system for humanitarian
exceptions to economic sanctions imposed on Taliban-controlled Afghanistan.
"They
want the deletion" of a paragraph of the resolution allowing the sanctions
committee responsible for Afghanistan to provide "exemptions from the
freezing of assets" if it considers that "such a waiver is necessary
to facilitate further assistance to Afghanistan," a diplomat told AFP on
condition of anonymity.
China,
which is "opposed in principle to sanctions," is "against a
case-by-case exemption mechanism," another diplomat confirmed.
"Humanitarian
aid and life-saving assistance must be able to reach the Afghan people without
any hindrance," China's UN Ambassador Zhang Jun said in a tweet Monday.
"Artificially created conditions or restrictions are not acceptable."
Washington
was hoping for approval on Monday of their draft by the other 14 members of the
Security Council, so that they could put it to a vote on Tuesday, diplomatic
sources said.
"There
are currently no humanitarian exemptions from the sanctions regime"
imposed on the Taliban in 2015 and for aid workers to "carry out financial
transactions with ministries headed by people under sanctions would violate
sanctions," said a diplomat.
Having
abandoned the disputed paragraph on case-by-case exemptions, the United States
submitted a new draft late Monday stating that, for the period of one year,
humanitarian assistance would not be deemed to violate sanctions on
Afghanistan.
(AFP)
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