Kabul, April 06: An Afghan official says a large proportion of the widespread corruption in Afghanistan is due to foreign involvement in fomenting the crisis.
The head of Afghanistan’s High Office of Oversight and Anti-corruption, Mohammad Yasin Osmani, in remarks addressed to the Senate on Monday said that foreigners are responsible for 80 percent of the corruption in the country, the Afghan Voice Agency reported.
He added that a 40-member US anti-corruption delegation has arrived in Kabul; and has so far assessed 36 cases of fraud in the foreign institution.
According to a recent UN report, the world community is focusing too much on short-term security and too little on long-term development in conflict-plagued Afghanistan.
It stresses that “widespread corruption further limits access to services for a large proportion of the population”. It notes that Afghanistan still has the second highest maternal mortality rate in the world and the third highest rate of child mortality.
“Only 23% of the population has access to safe drinking water and only 24% above the age of 15 can read and write,” said Rupert Colville, a spokesman for the office of the UN human rights commissioner.
Meanwhile, Afghan President Hamid Karzai has accused Western officials of bribing and threatening election staff and perpetrating vote fraud in an attempt to weaken both him and the parliament.
Although the Afghan president, who was declared the winner of the presidential race in November after his opponent Abdullah Abdullah bowed out, did not directly mention the US, the White House expressed deep concern over Karzai’s remarks.
His comments drew a sharp rebuke from Washington. US State Department Spokesman Philip J Crowley called them “preposterous” and White House spokesman Robert Gibbs described them as “troubling.”
Karzai later said that he was ‘surprised’ that his remarks have caused such uproar.
——–Agencies