China calls on G20 members to help ease the liquidity pressure in Afghanistan

At the G20 virtual foreign ministers’ meeting on Afghanistan yesterday, China reiterated its support for the interim Taliban government in Kabul. Chinese state councillor and foreign minister Wang Yi attended the meet virtually and said that Economic sanctions against Afghanistan must end and unilateral restrictions on the country should be lifted as soon as possible. Sanctions should not be used as leverage to exert political pressure on Afghanistan, the Chinese foreign ministry said in a statement on Wang Yi’s speech at the virtual meet.

China calls on G20 members to actively adopt concrete measures to help ease the liquidity pressure in Afghanistan, the statement said citing Wang Yi. Afghanistan’s peaceful reconstruction and medium and long-term development cannot do without financial support from the international community, the top Chinese diplomat said. Wang Yi called on the Group of 20 (G20) to speed up their efforts to provide humanitarian aid to



Afghanistan.

China announced earlier this month that it had decided to urgently provide 200-million-yuan ($30.96 million) worth of grains, winter supplies, vaccines and other medicines to Afghanistan, including an initial 3 million doses of Covid-19 vaccines, Wang Yi noted. The international community should also help Afghanistan speed up its economic reconstruction and fundamentally reduce the number of refugees and migrants, the statement said.

A hardline interim Taliban govt in Afghanistan is relying mainly on China’s support for getting international recognition after capturing Kabul by force. Just days ago, the First Foreign Ministers’ Meeting on the Afghan Issue Among the Neighboring Countries of Afghanistan and the Informal Meeting of Foreign Ministers of China, Russia, Pakistan and Iran on the Afghan Issue was held in an effort to reach a consensus among these countries on the Afghan issue.