WASHINGTON — Calls are growing on Capitol Hill for the Biden administration to release some of the billions of dollars in seized Afghan financial assets the United States is keeping frozen.
The calls from dozens of Democrats, and at least one Republican, have become more urgent in recent weeks as worries deepen about the massive hunger crisis confronting Afghanistan’s citizens — as well as how a local Islamic State group might exploit the dwindling conditions to capture more territory in the troubled South Asian country.
When the Taliban seized power in August, the Biden administration responded by quickly taking control of the vast majority of the former Kabul central government’s foreign reserves — roughly $9.4 billion. The overwhelming amount of that sum were held in U.S. banks, including $7 billion kept at the Federal Reserve Bank of New York.
