The United Nations chief said Thursday that nearly all Afghans don’t have enough to eat and some have resorted to “selling their children and their body parts” to get money for food. Secretary-General Antonio Guterres’ statement was part of a dramatic appeal Thursday from the world body and several rich countries that want to help beleaguered Afghans whose fate has worsened since the Taliban returned to power last year. Guterres kicked off a virtual pledging conference led by the U.N.’s aid coordination office and backed by Britain, Germany, and Qatar, seeking to make inroads on its biggest-ever appeal for funds for a single country: $4.4 billion. It is a decidedly ambitious call when much of the world’s attention is on Russia’s war in Ukraine, and some wealthy nations have tried to squeeze the Taliban.
Guterres called on the world to “spare” Afghans who have had their rights stripped—like many women and girls—after the ouster of the internationally backed government last summer, prompting some rich countries to freeze nearly $9 billion in Afghan assets overseas so the Taliban can’t access them. “Wealthy, powerful countries cannot ignore the consequences of their decisions on the most vulnerable,” Guterres said. “Some 95 percent of people do not have enough to eat, and nine million people are at risk of famine,” he added, citing UNICEF estimates that over a million severely malnourished children “are on the verge of death without immediate action.”
“Without immediate action we face a starvation and malnutrition crisis in Afghanistan,” he said. “People are already selling their children and their body parts in order to feed their families.” Afghanistan is buckling beneath a debilitating humanitarian crisis and an economy in free fall. Some 23 million people face acute food insecurity, the UN says.
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