Tens of millions of dollars disappeared from the bank accounts of the Afghan government during the Taliban takeover, according to a US government report | “Everyone had $ 5,000 to $ 10,000 in their pockets, no one had millions”
The U.S. is investigating allegations that Afghan government officials took tens of millions of dollars with them when they fled the country. Former Afghan President Ashraf Ghani was specifically accused of loading millions of dollars on the helicopters he and his close aides used to flee Kabul when Taliban fighters entered the capital Kabul.
Tens of millions of dollars disappeared from the bank accounts of the Afghan government during the Taliban takeover last August, according to a U.S. government report released Monday, the latest in a series detailing the collapse of the Afghan government and its military.
Following the Taliban’s sudden military takeover of Afghanistan, there have been media reports that President Ghani who fled to the UAE stole more than $ 150 million from government funds when he escaped.
But SIGAR, which investigated the stolen funds, found the theft of the millions “unreasonable”, but said that the former president left with “little cash”, and the evidence suggests that this number did not exceed $ 1 million and may have been closer to $ 500,000. . The report quotes a former senior official who fled with Gani on the helicopters and stated that “everyone had $ 5,000 to $ 10,000 in their pockets, no one had millions.” Gani has repeatedly denied the allegations of theft.
In contrast, tens of millions who have disappeared have remained unexplained so far. But SIGAR found evidence of “$ 5 million taken from the presidential palace and tens of millions taken from the safe at the National Security Administration,” the former Afghan government’s chief intelligence agency. The investigation did not determine whether the money was taken out of the country by government officials.