Taliban Accepts U.S. Coronavirus Vaccines, but Won’t Say Thank You

Taliban fighters walk along a roadside at Shahr-e Naw neighbourhood in Kabul on December 9
WAKIL KOHSAR/AFP via Getty Images
Frances Martel

The Taliban quietly accepted an offer of 1 million doses of Chinese coronavirus vaccines in addition to nearly half a billion dollars in humanitarian aid from America on Wednesday, letting a deputy minister respond to the offer while touting similar support on a grander scale from China.

The Taliban has been the functional government of Afghanistan since August 15, when it stormed the capital city of Kabul as former President Ashraf Ghani abruptly fled. The Taliban’s return to power was made possible by President Joe Biden violating an agreement the jihadists had signed onto with former President Donald Trump in which they vowed not to attack foreign forces so long as American troops left the country by May 2021. When Biden announced he would extend the 20-year Afghan War, the Taliban launched a national conquest campaign ending in August, days after the Pentagon claimed to have shut down operations there.

No country has recognized the Taliban as the official government of Afghanistan, but rogue states like China and Russia have established de facto diplomatic ties to the jihadist terrorist organization. The United Nations has deferred the decision on granting Afghanistan’s seat at the organization to Taliban jihadists, but U.N. agencies work with the Taliban to fund it with humanitarian aid.

According to the Afghan network Tolo News, American special representative for Afghanistan, Thomas West, announced that Washington would donate the vaccine doses through the international vaccine alliance.

The announcement pointedly claimed the donations all went to the “Afghan people” without specifying who would receive and distribute the aid. Tolo reported that a Taliban “deputy prime minister,” Abdul Salam Hanafi, confirmed the Taliban terrorist organization would receive it. The Afghan Taliban is not a U.S.-designated Foreign Terrorist Organization, so the limits that exist on other such terrorist groups to receive U.S. funding do not apply.

Tolo quoted Hanafi complaining that the Taliban could not access Afghan government assets frozen in response to the collapse of the Afghan government, rather than thanking the United States.

“We even can’t purchase health supplies for the patients who are affected with Covid-19. We welcome this aid provided by the US,” Hanafi reportedly said.

The Biden administration has led the charge to freeze Afghan government assets, most prominently resulting in the Taliban not being able to access funds from the World Bank or International Monetary Fund (IMF), international institutions that expressed concerns about the group’s atrocious human rights record. Afghan assets in American banks also remain frozen.

The Taliban Foreign Ministry confirmed through a spokesman this weekend that the U.S. Treasury had also made another favorable move for the Taliban: freeing money wiring companies like Western Union to allow Afghan families to send money to the Taliban without concerns for violating prohibitions on funding terrorists. Spokesman Abdul Qahar Balkhi called it a “good move” and stated that the Taliban leaders “appreciate this progress” but stopped short of saying thank you.

The Taliban leadership has repeatedly stated that it seeks to establish formal diplomatic ties with the United States despite going to war with the country for the past two decades. It has not been opaque in noting that its primary driver for such a relationship is money. In a letter to Congress read aloud in English in a recorded video last month, Balkhi, the foreign ministry spokesman, specifically asked American lawmakers to fund the jihadist group. Balkhi was reading a letter signed by “acting foreign minister” Amir Khan Muttaqi.

“We no longer find ourselves in direct conflict with one another nor are we a military opposition, what logic could possibly exist behind the freezing of our assets?” Muttaqi asked. “The Afghan people, after attaining personal security following decades of war, have a right to financial security.”

Muttaqi also bizarrely referred to funding the Taliban as “the demand of the American people.”

The Afghan War began because the Taliban had close ties to, and still maintain them, with al-Qaeda, the organization responsible for the September 11, 2001, terrorist attacks that killed thousands in the United States. This week, White House Press Secretary Jen Psaki stated that the families of the victims of those attacks had specifically requested that money, according to Khaama Press, an Afghan news agency.

The minimal recognition of help from Washington pales in comparison to the effusive praise the Taliban have for Beijing. Top Taliban spokesman Zabihullah Mujahid published photos on Tuesday showing Chinese Ambassador to Afghanistan Wang Yu meeting with Taliban members to hand over significant “humanitarian aid,” calling Chinese aid in particular “very important.”

Deputy Taliban spokesman Bilal Karimi published an extensive Twitter thread this week emphasizing the importance of Chinese communist influence in the Taliban’s Afghanistan.

“We want more cooperation with other countries, especially China,” Karimi wrote. Taliban profiles like Muhajid’s heartily amplified the message.

China has been one of the most prominent countries calling not just for unfreezing assets to the Taliban, but demanding Washington fund its success by avoiding sanctions and offering humanitarian aid.

Follow Frances Martel on Facebook and Twitter.

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