Role Media Plays in U.S.-Africa Relations: Third Panel of African Peoples’ Forum

Editor’s Note: The following is the writer’s analysis and was originally published by CovertAction Magazine.

Over the past few months, U.S. lawmakers, the Afghan government, and the international community have called on Washington to stop strangling the Afghan economy as its people continue to suffer from a U.S.-created humanitarian crisis. On December 22, the Biden administration effectively rejected those calls, opting instead for half-measures that will do little to counter the effects of stringent economic sanctions imposed on the Taliban or to improve the material well-being of the Afghan people.

Sanctions in Context

Contrary to the narrative of U.S. politicians and journalists, the August withdrawal of U.S. and NATO forces from Afghanistan did not mark the end of the United States’ so-called “forever war” but rather a shift in U.S. policy—from direct military intervention and occupation to one based on economic sanctions and indirect political subversion. Although the tactics changed, the goal is the same: The accumulation of wealth and power through class warfare against the Afghan people.

Just days after Kabul fell to the Taliban on August 15, Washington took measures to turn off the flow of funds to the new government and paralyze the Afghan banking system. The Treasury Department quickly issued a freeze order on nearly $9.5 billion of the Afghan Central Bank’s assets held in U.S. financial institutions, including the New York Federal Reserve Bank. 

Although the Taliban was entitled to receive more than $460 million from the International Monetary Fund (IMF) in currency reserves known as Special Drawing Rights, or SDRs, the U.S. directed the IMF to block those funds as well.

President Biden has also ensured that $1.3 billion of Afghan funds held in international accounts remain frozen, including funds denominated in euros and British pounds and those held by the Swiss-based Bank for International Sanctions.

Notably, these punitive measures are in addition to the pre-existing economic sanctions that the U.S. has imposed on the Taliban, which began in 1999 under President Bill Clinton and which President George W. Bush ramped up following the 9/11 attack as part of the U.S.’s newly created counterterrorism sanctions program, known as the Specially Designated Global Terrorist list. The Obama and Trump administrations followed suit by imposing over 100 and 23 sanction orders, respectively, against Taliban-related targets.

Despite purported exemptions for humanitarian aid, the lack of clarity under U.S. law deters financial institutions from processing such transactions out of fear of violating U.S. sanctions—which not only freeze all assets associated with the Taliban; they subject any individual or entity that conducts a transaction involving the Taliban to criminal liability. The ubiquity of U.S. dollars and financial institutions in international commerce provides the U.S. with virtually global jurisdiction.

Horrific Consequences of Sanctions

Decades of U.S. occupation and war have left Afghanistan a poor country dependent on external sources to fund public spending. No longer able to rely on brute military and political force to protect the interests of Western capital in Afghanistan, U.S. strategists understand that seizing the central bank’s money and cutting all international aid gives Washington powerful leverage against the Taliban, all while inflicting maximum pain on the Afghan people, who continue to be relegated to “starving pawns in big power games.”

The horrific and totally foreseeable consequences of these sanctions have, so far, been well documented by international humanitarian organizations, even if they are reluctant to depict the United States as culpable. 

On October 25, the UN’s Food and Agriculture Organization and World Food Program published a report urging humanitarian assistance, warning that Afghanistan is on a “countdown to catastrophe.” According to the report, more than 50% of Afghans will face “crisis” or “emergency” levels of acute food insecurity, including over 3 million children under the age of five.

On November 22, the United Nations Development Program (UNDP) published a report warning that Afghanistan’s financial and bank payment systems are “in disarray” and on the verge of collapse. The UNDP report, citing the IMF, predicts the Afghan economy could contract by 30% for 2021-2022.  

On December 6, the International Crisis Group issued a more scathing report, warning that the “hunger and destitution” caused by “economic strangulation,” imposed by the West in response to the Taliban takeover, could “kill more Afghans than all the bombs and bullets of the past two decades.”

In other words, U.S. policy of intentionally starving the Afghan people through economic sanctions on Afghanistan is going as planned. As many predicted, blocking funds from the Taliban and curtailing foreign aid and assistance would lead to a rapid financial meltdown and exacerbate the ongoing famine plaguing Afghanistan.

U.S. Retaliates for Taliban’s Military Success

Despite the Taliban’s success in forcing the U.S. government to the negotiating table in Doha and then ousting the U.S. military from Afghanistan, or rather, because of that success, Washington has made it clear that it has no plans to respect Afghanistan’s sovereignty. Indeed, the Biden administration’s response to pleas that the asset freeze be lifted demonstrates the hypocrisy and callousness of U.S. foreign policy.

On November 17, as reported by Tolo News, Mawlawi Amir Khan Muttaqi, Acting Minister of Foreign Affairs of the Islamic Emirate of Afghanistan, sent a letter to the U.S. Congress calling for the return of Afghan assets, correctly noting that “the fundamental challenge of our people is financial security, and the roots of this concern lead back to the freezing of assets of our people by the American government.”

The U.S. Special Representative for Afghanistan, Thomas West, rejected the Taliban’s request in a series of revealing tweets. West’s remarks effectively admitted that the dire situation pre-dates the Taliban takeover and confirmed that the United States was preventing “critical” international aid from reaching Afghanistan as retribution for the Taliban’s military success, while recognizing that Afghanistan’s “economy [is] enormously dependent on aid, including for basic services.” 

Further, in a fashion typical of bourgeois idealism, which values words and appearances over substance and material reality, West condescendingly lectured the Taliban that “[l]egitmacy and support must be earned” and confirmed that the United States would consider lifting the murderous sanctions if the Taliban only learned to “respect the rights of minorities, women and girls.” 

The irony of Washington’s position of respecting humanitarian rights by denying humanitarian aid was not lost on Muttaqi, who, in response to West’s tweets, questioned the tortured logic: “The U.S. froze our assets and then told us that it will provide us humanitarian aid. What does it mean?” Muttaqi reiterated the demand to release Afghanistan’s assets: “The assets should be freed immediately. The Americans don’t have any military front with us now. What is the reason for freezing the assets? The assets don’t belong to the Mujahideen (Islamic Emirate) but to the people of Afghanistan.”

In tacit acknowledgment that the state needs legitimacy to stabilize its rule, the U.S.-driven humanitarian crisis has prompted members of Congress to ask the Biden administration to reconsider certain aspects of its sanctions policy in light of the dire warnings issued by the UNDP and World Food Program.

On December 15, a bipartisan group of 39 lawmakers wrote a letter to the State and Treasury departments calling on the Biden administration to “allow international financial institutions to inject the necessary economic capital into Afghanistan while avoiding the transfer of money to the Taliban-led government” and designate a “private Afghan or third-country bank” as a central bank. The lawmakers also recommended, among other things, the release of the $9.5 billion of Afghan assets—but only if sent “to an appropriate United Nations agency” and only if used “to pay teacher salaries and provide meals to children in schools, so long as girls can continue to attend.”

On December 20, a group of 46 lawmakers led by House progressives wrote a similar letter to President Biden, explicitly linking the “U.S. confiscation of $9.4 billion” of Afghan assets to “contributing to soaring inflation” and “plunging the country…deeper into economic and humanitarian crisis.” Although the House progressives struck a harsher tone, they made the same requests as the December 19 letter, urging President Biden to allow Afghanistan’s central bank to access its reserves, consistent with proposals by “[c]urrent and former Afghan central bank officials appointed by the U.S.-supported government” and supported by “private sector associations such as the Afghan Chamber of Commerce and Investment and the Afghanistan Banks Association.”

This congressional pushback, tepid as it is, also reflects an inherent tension in the U.S. use of sanctions: While economic warfare is a necessary tool of U.S. foreign policy, sanctions are not always good for business in the short term. Afghanistan had been a source of wealth for the imperialist bourgeoise for the past two decades, and now certain sectors of the capitalist class apparently want back in.

Still, the Biden administration has shown no sign of easing the sanctions. In fact, the Biden administration is considering permanently depriving the Afghan people of the funds needed to combat the current humanitarian crisis, by transferring those funds instead to U.S. plaintiffs with outstanding default judgments against the Taliban. That is what two groups of judgment creditors have argued to U.S. federal judges. (Those cases are captioned Havlish et al. v. Bin-Laden et al., No. 03 Civ. 9848, and Doe v. The Taliban et al., No. 20 Misc. 740, and are pending in the Southern District of New York before Judges Daniels and Failla, respectively.)

Although its formal statement is not due until January 18, the Biden administration seems willing to go along with the plan—the only apparent obstacle is how to seize the Afghan funds without recognizing the Taliban as the legitimate Afghan government. Press Secretary Jen Psaki has twice cited that ongoing litigation as the primary reason for maintaining the asset freeze.

Following its imperial playbook, the U.S. sanctions imposed on Afghanistan are aimed at destabilizing Afghan civil society, making daily life so unbearable that the Afghan people eventually blame the Taliban for their misery, providing the United States and its proxies an opening to enact regime change.

Similar to sanctions imposed on Venezuela, Cuba, Iran, Zimbabwe, Eritrea, Nicaragua, and many others, the sanctions on Afghanistan are having their intended effect, which is to deprive the masses of essential goods and services as punishment whenever a government refuses to surrender its nation’s resources and sovereignty to the demands of U.S. and European capital. 

Now more than ever, those in the imperial core must demand the end of U.S.-imposed sanctions against the Afghan people and oppressed people all over the world.

Aakash Hassan, a 25-year-old independent journalist from the conflict-torn Indian administered Kashmir region, was slated to travel to Sri Lanka for a reporting assignment earlier this year. As Hassan was about to board a flight at New Delhi’s Indira Gandhi International Airport, Indian immigration authorities stopped him. Hassan was provided no reason for the travel ban. However, his boarding pass was stamped with a message: “Stopped without prejudice.”

Although Indian authorities maintain silence about their decision, Akash is sure of what led to this: “It is because of the kind of journalism I practice.”

Arbitrary travel bans against journalists and activists critical of the ruling Hindu nationalist Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) are trending in India. This is particularly the case for journalists from the disputed Himalayan region of Kashmir. The BJP-led government revoked in 2019 the Muslim-majority Kashmir territory’s autonomous status, resulting in the arrest of activists, academics and journalists.

However, the Indian government has provided no explanation for recent travel bans. Meanwhile, immigration officials have yet to respond to this reporter’s inquiries. Plus, not a single journalist this reporter is acquainted with has been able to obtain the government’s comment on this issue.

“I don’t know what kind of crime I have committed, for which there is a travel ban on me. Stopping us [journalists] from traveling is not only an attack on our personal liberty, but also [on] our fundamental rights,” Hassan told Toward Freedom. “The government should at least provide a reason as to why our freedom to travel is curtailed.”

BJP-Led India’s Flight Bans

Hassan’s is not an isolated case.

Last month, journalist Sanna Irshad Mattoo was also barred from flying to the United States to receive a prestigious award. She had won the 2022 Pulitzer Prize for feature photography for documenting the impact of the COVID-19 pandemic in India. This was the second time in six months she was not allowed to travel outside the country.

In a similar vein, Aakar Patel, a vocal critic of India’s current right-wing regime who once led Amnesty International’s work in the country, was stopped from flying to the United States in April.

Experts based out of the region say that the Indian government is getting increasingly intolerant towards its criticism and dissenting voices are being crushed through intimidation, arbitrary detentions and now travel bans.

“In today’s India, which, if you’re not a propagandist, then you risk being arrested or banned. You risk your funding or sources being cut off,” Kavita Krishnan, a prominent human rights activist and an opposition voice based in India, told Toward Freedom.

Shrinking Freedoms

Punitive actions against critics and journalists have led India to slide down all the major human-rights and freedom indices in the past few years.

Reporters Without Borders (RSF)’s latest “World Press Freedom Rankings” rated India 150th on a list of 180 countries, slipping eight positions since last year.

“The violence against journalists, the politically partisan media and the concentration of media ownership all demonstrate that press freedom is in crisis in ‘the world’s largest democracy,’” RSF noted in its report.

India also ranked 119th out of 165 jurisdictions in the 2021 Human Freedom Index. Its “media self-censorship” score was 3.2 out of 10.

Plus, with a score of 66, the country was listed as “partly free” by the Freedom House’s Global Freedom Score.

The Freedom House mentioned in its report:

“Authorities have used security, defamation, sedition, and hate speech laws, as well as contempt-of-court charges, to quiet critical voices in the media. Hindu nationalist campaigns aimed at discouraging forms of expression deemed ‘anti-national’ have exacerbated self-censorship.”

“The problem with this regime is that they consider that universal standards of democracy, human rights, press freedom don’t apply to them,” Krishnan added.

“They don’t care about violating the rights of people, as they believe themselves to be invincible.”

Intimidation, Arrests and Harassment

For Jenni Rowena, the wife of 55-year-old professor Hany Babu, life has turned miserable ever since his arrest in July 2020. For more than two years, Babu—a vocal BJP critic—has been denied bail, as the Indian government, along with several other prominent academics and activists, have accused him of conspiring against the country and plotting the assassination of Prime Minister Narendra Modi.

“Everyone knows Babu’s political position. He has been a scholar working for the marginalized and minorities. They are targeting him for his work. You’re not supposed to do anything that questions the government or society or any institution,” Rowena told Toward Freedom. “Cases against him have been fabricated, so as to prolong his trials and keep him in prison.”

Pawan Khera, the national spokesperson of India’s main opposition party, the Indian National Congress, said the country seems to be under an “undeclared” emergency.

“Forget dissent, even questioning the government for its mistakes can land you in trouble,” Khera said in an exclusive interview with Toward Freedom. “This government is known to be misusing [central] agencies whenever anybody goes against them.”

India had officially declared a 21-month period of emergency in 1975, leading to the suspension of civil liberties and media censorship.

“You can see the reflections of the emergency period,” said Shabnam Hashmi, a veteran human-rights activist, “but, even then, there was not so much hatred in India and people of this country were united. See, they all came together—forgetting about their differences with each other—and fought. But, now, the people are polarized.”

Journalists Self-Censor

Quratulain Rehbar, a freelance journalist who has critically reported about the Indian government’s policies from the Kashmir valley, said it is almost impossible to publish stories that don’t toe the state narrative.

“I have been subjected to various forms of harassment by authorities and security forces,” Rehbar told Toward Freedom. Many of her colleagues from the region—like Sajid Gul, Fahad Shah and Aasif Sultan—languish in jails across the country under criminal and terrorism charges because the government recently invoked draconian anti-terrorism laws against journalists and activists. For example, the 1967 Unlawful Activities (Prevention) Act lets the government detain a person for several months without bail.

“In such an atmosphere, I had to take a stand to not write too [many] critical pieces against the government because that would easily put me in trouble,” Rehbar said in a dejected tone. “Now, I am [censoring] myself, like many other colleagues.”

Activists like Hashmi assert India is moving toward “total fascism.”

“But if this government is not defeated, then we could be seeing times like in Afghanistan, Pakistan or in Nazi Germany,” said Hashmi, who is based out of New Delhi. “Almost everything and every institution is penetrated by extreme right-wing ideologues, who do not believe in democracy. So, the future seems very dark for the country.”

Hanan Zaffar is documentary filmmaker and journalist based in South Asia. His work has appeared in Al Jazeera, DW News, Channel 4, Business Insider, TRT World, Newsweek, Newlines Magazine and other media publications. Find him on Twitter at @HananZaffar.

Jyoti Thakur is an independent journalist based in New Delhi. She covers the environment and human rights.

Editor’s Note: This article originally appeared in People’s Dispatch.

Dismissing a now-deleted tweet by Kenyan President William Ruto about rescinding recognition of the Sahrawi Arab Democratic Republic (SADR), the Kenyan foreign ministry clarified on September 16 that it would continue to maintain diplomatic relations with SADR and support its right to self-determination.

Also known as Western Sahara, SADR is a founding member of the African Union (AU) and the continent’s last colony, fighting a war for liberation from Morocco. The Moroccan occupation of most of SADR’s territory since 1975 has been receiving increasing Western support, despite a consensus in international law that Morocco has no legitimate territorial claims over SADR, whose right to self-determination is well-recognized.

But Kenya has emerged as an important ally, championing SADR’s cause over the last decade. Ruto’s decision to change this foreign policy, only a day after his swearing-in ceremony, which was also attended by SADR President Brahim Ghali, was reversed as a result of public backlash and dissonance within the foreign ministry, sources and reports indicate.

“Kenya’s position [on SADR] is fully aligned with… the AU Charter which calls for the unquestionable and inalienable right of a people to self-determination,” read the foreign ministry communique dated September 16, addressing all of Kenya’s missions and directorates.

This communique, which was made public on Monday, September 19, reiterated, “UN Security Council Resolution 690 (1991)… calls for the self-determination of Western Sahara through a free and fair referendum administered by the UN and the AU. Kenya supports implementation of this UN security Council Resolution to the letter.”

Implicitly criticizing the new president’s hasty announcement, the communique signed by principal secretary Ambassador Macharia Kamau added, “It should be equally noted that Kenya does not conduct its foreign policy on Twitter or any other social media platforms, rather through official government documents and frameworks.”

Following a meeting with Moroccan Foreign Minister Nasser Bourita, Ruto had tweeted on September 14, “At State House in Nairobi, received a congratulatory message from His Majesty King Mohammed VI. Kenya rescinds its recognition of the SADR and initiates steps to wind down the entity’s presence in the country.”

While the tweet was soon deleted, Morocco’s foreign ministry released an official statement on its website the same day, announcing: “Following the message of His Majesty King Mohammed VI to the new President of the Republic of Kenya, Mr. William Ruto, the Republic of Kenya has decided to withdraw the recognition of the so-called ‘SADR’ and to initiate the steps to close its representation in Nairobi.”

The statement further claimed that Morocco and Kenya had signed a joint statement agreeing that “in deference to the principle of territorial integrity and non-interference, the Republic of Kenya [had extended] total support to the serious and credible autonomy plan proposed by the Kingdom of Morocco” as the only possible solution to the Sahara issue.

The Kenyan foreign ministry’s communique two days later in effect clarified that the tweet by the president had been arbitrary and had no bearing on the country’s foreign policy. This was a setback to Morocco, which had declared a diplomatic victory over SADR prematurely, before any official announcement by the Kenyan government.

Asked to explain the sudden change in stance and dissonance within the government, Kenya’s Deputy President Rigathi Gachagua told KTN News on Monday, “This was an administration in transition—[having been] only one day in office… We had many visitors, there [were] so many delegations, and communications had to be made.” He said this without specifying which countries’ delegations or visitors had sought for such a communication to be made.

Gachagua stressed that the most important thing was that “a clarification had been made,” and that the country’s position was “that of the United Nations and that of the African Union.”

United States and Israel Allegedly Lobbying Kenya

Even before the election was held in August this year, the United States and the United Kingdom, which were allegedly supporting Ruto’s candidacy, had sought from him a reversal of Kenya’s policy on SADR during his foreign trips, alleged Booker Ngesa Omole, National Vice Chairperson of the Communist Party of Kenya (CPK).

The UN, the AU, the Court of Justice of the European Union and the International Court of Justice all maintain that Morocco has no legitimate territorial claims over SADR. Nevertheless, in late 2020, then-U.S. President Donald Trump had announced his decision to open a consulate in occupied Western Sahara, in effect recognizing it as Moroccan sovereign territory.

After Ruto was declared the president-elect, a presidential delegation from the United States earlier this month and the subsequent Israeli delegation led by its minister of intelligence, had both allegedly brought up Kenya’s policy vis-à-vis SADR in the meetings with Ruto, Omole claimed.

Morocco, which is the second largest exporter of fertilizer in the world, had in the meantime seen a further opening in Ruto’s election promise of providing cheap fertilizers, he explained. With an apparent assurance from Morocco about “providing fertilizers at subsidized prices, Ruto went on national television to announce that he will provide subsidies to all farmers on fertilizers within two weeks time. A day later, he announced he was rescinding SADR’s recognition,” Omole said.

The bulk of the phosphate used in Moroccan fertilizers is extracted from the occupied Western Sahara. “The Moroccan regime uses the resources stolen from Western Sahara to bribe foreign officials to obtain recognition for its illegal occupation of our homeland,” Kamal Fadel, SADR’s Representative to Australia and the Pacific, told Peoples Dispatch.

“Those who receive the stolen goods from Western Sahara are complicit in the war crime of pillage and their involvement is a tacit support to an illegal occupation—one with continuing notorious human rights abuses occurring during a time of armed conflict,” he added.

Pointing out that within an hour of Ruto’s announcement, “Kenyans had jumped on his tweet, attacking him for surrendering sovereign foreign policy to Moroccan bribes,” Omole explained that there is a strong sentiment against what is perceived as a return to old foreign policy.

‘Kenyan Population Supports the Sahrawi People’

“Except for the last 10 years, Kenya has not had a progressive foreign policy. It was always a wait-and-see opportunistic policy, aligning with whichever position brings in most alms from foreign countries. So our relations with Western Sahara had always been strained,” Omole told Peoples Dispatch.

In 2006, Kenyan President Mwai Kibaki had placed diplomatic relations with SADR on “a temporary freeze” only months after first receiving diplomatic credentials from its ambassador. “But the Kenyan masses are always ahead of their governments. There was an uproar here, led by the Kenya Western Sahara Friendship Society (KWSFS),” said Omole, who has been a member of the KWSFS for 20 years.

“This organization has been fostering people-to-people friendship between the two countries. A few times, we have also hosted families from the refugee camps [of the displaced Sahrawis in Algeria]. Kenyan people lobbied the government to condemn Morocco’s occupation,” he explained. Under popular pressure, “Kibaki had to initiate the process to re-establish diplomatic relations with SADR.”

While this was unfolding, Uhuru Kenyatta and William Ruto, who at the time were contesting the 2013 election together as presidential and vice-presidential candidates, were put on trial by the International Criminal Court (ICC). They were tried for charges of crimes against humanity for political violence in the aftermath of the 2007 presidential election. The charges were subsequently dropped.

However, Kenyatta did not take the alleged U.S. and U.K. support for this trial well, Omole claimed. “After he won the election, he went about changing Kenya’s foreign policy against the interests of the West. He pursued alternative trade relations with the East, instead of continuing to rely on the West. He refused to follow Israel’s line and supported Palestine. He opened the SADR’s embassy in Nairobi, and, for the first time, Kenya appointed an ambassador to SADR. For the first time, a Kenyan ambassador presented his credentials to the president of the SADR.”

In the regional and international forums of the AU and the UN, Kenya actively supported the cause of the SADR. “The progressive foreign policy has continued since,” and during this period Kenyan people’s relations and solidarity with the Sahrawi people has deepened, Omole said.

There is a high degree of “awareness among the Kenyan people about the Sahrawi people’s struggle for liberation. It seems our new president was out of touch with the reality that the Kenyan population supports the Sahrawi people, regardless of the divisions that will be sown by governments,” he observed.