US Secretary of State Antony Blinken on Tuesday called on the international community to press the Islamic Emirate of Afghanistan (IEA) to respect the rights of all Afghans.

Addressing the 49th session of the United Nations Human Rights Council, Blinken also called for redoubling efforts to address the “growing” humanitarian crisis in Afghanistan.

“We must redouble our efforts to address the growing humanitarian crisis in Afghanistan, and press the Taliban (IEA) to respect the rights of all Afghans, including by stopping the unjust detentions of women protestors and journalists, ending reprisals, and allowing all Afghans to be educated and work in every sector,” Blinken said.

Respect for the fundamental rights of citizens and the protection of Afghan women’s political and civil rights is a condition by the international community for recognition of the current government in Afghanistan.

IEA, however, says it is committed to ensuring the rights of all Afghans.
“Major problems will not arise with a government that is committed to people’s rights and welfare,” said Bilal Karimi, deputy spokesman for IEA.

Meanwhile, US Special Representative for Afghanistan Tom West has said that it has been a collective international effort to press IEA to allow aid workers access across the country, and the dialogue with it in this regard has been fruitful.

Speaking to US broadcaster NPR, West said that private sector actors in Europe have shipped several hundred million dollars physically to Afghanistan.

“So far the Taliban has not sought to intervene in or seize any of those shipments,” West said.

The executive board of the World Bank on Tuesday approved a plan to use more than $1 billion from a frozen Afghanistan trust fund to finance urgently needed education, agriculture, health and family programs, the bank announced.

The plan, which will bypass sanctioned Islamic Emirate of Afghanistan (IEA) authorities by disbursing the money through U.N. agencies and international aid groups, will provide a major boost to efforts to ease the country’s worsening humanitarian and economic crises, Reuters reported.

The approach “aims to support the delivery of essential basic services, protect vulnerable Afghans, help preserve human capital and key economic and social services, and reduce the need for humanitarian assistance in the future,” the bank said in a statement.

Afghanistan Reconstruction Trust Fund (ARTF) was frozen in August when the IEA overran Kabul as the last U.S.-led international troops departed after 20 years of war.

According to the report foreign governments ended financial aid constituting more than 70% of government expenditures while the United States led in the freezing of some $9 billion in Afghan central bank funds.

The funding cuts accelerated an economic collapse, fueling a cash crunch and deepening a humanitarian crisis that the United Nations says has pushed more than half of Afghanistan’s population of 39 million to the verge of starvation, read the report.

The World Bank statement said that as a first step, ARTF donors will decide on four projects worth about $600 million that will support “urgent needs in education, heath and agricultural sectors, as well as community livelihoods.”

There will be a “strong focus on ensuring that girls and women participate and benefit from the support,” the statement continued.