February 27th, 2025
Dear friends,
this OFARIN newsletter is overdue. February has far too few days. That gets a work-shy person like me into trouble every year. What’s more, this time there’s not much that I can reliably report from Afghanistan.
Money that we send from our bank in Germany to our account at Azizi Bank in Kabul goes through several intermediary banks. One of them checks on behalf of the EU whether transfers are money laundering and whether the money transferred ends up with someone on a list of terrorists. Money that we sent in October was released in January. Since then, shipments have not been interrupted again.
Such interventions cause chaos and mistrust. The clean-up work has not yet been completed. Our classes could be supplied with wood and heated. The teachers were initially only paid a monthly salary and are now gradually receiving the money they are entitled to. In Khost, almost 600 men who dug 40,500 pits in the Dzadzi Maidan district have been paid. People are in a hurry because the month of fasting begins in a few days. They don’t want to go hungry in the evening too. The seedlings for the nut trees have not yet been bought. That has to happen quickly. In Kabul, pupils whose eye tests had revealed deficits were provided with glasses. Three operations were even carried out.
The power struggle among the Taliban seems to be coming to a head. Since taking office, Haibatullah, the Emir, has practically prevented women and girls from training and working and has severely restricted the work of aid organizations. However, there is a majority among the Taliban, including among their top personnel, who want to modernize Afghanistan and lead it towards harmonious coexistence with other peoples. So far, these modern-minded Taliban have not publicly contradicted the Emir, presumably because they fear that an open confrontation would lead to the disintegration of their movement and to civil war and foreign interference. In recent weeks, however, leading Taliban have publicly formulated their goals and their dissatisfaction with official policy. It is difficult for an outsider to assess developments and it is not appropriate to do so publicly. We can only wish Afghanistan and its people all the best.
By the way, the Weltladen Würzburg and the Würzburg Peace Prize Committee are organizing an Afghanistan evening together with OFARIN on 10 March at 7 p.m. in the Weltladen Würzburg, Plattnerstr. 14, where we will be reporting on our work.
Kind regards,
Peter Schwittek