President Joe Biden’s decision to actually seize the Afghan central bank’s funds in the United States and repurpose half of the money as compensation to the victims who suffered in the 9/11 attacks has drawn denunciation and accusations of the “theft” against Washington.

Biden allocated an executive order on February 11, Friday that would divide $7.1 billion belongings to Da Afghanistan Banks (DAB), almost equal between humanitarian help in order to struggle in country ad funds to cover judgements from lawsuits that 9/11 victims and their families had filed against the Taliban in US courts.

According to ‘Bilal Askaryar’, an Afghan-American activist, “There is no role of the Afghan residents in the 9/11; that is an undoubtful fact.”

“What Biden is offering to the victims is not just for 9/11 families. It is stealing of public funds from an underprivileged nation already on the verge of famine and starvation brought on by the United States’ disastrous withdrawal.”

The US-backed Afghan government collapsed in August in 2021, with the Taliban seizing Kabul amid the pullout of US troops from the country after a 20-year war.

Washington, who had bargained its withdrawal with the Taliban, quickly moved to freeze DAB’s US-based assets. The 9/11 victims families then demand the money through the courts. One particular case that had received a default judgement against the Taliban in 2021 became central in that effort.

The complainants initially sued a host of commodities and people across the Middle East and Afghanistan – many at odds with one another and adversarial to al-Qaeda, which took out the attacks in 2001. The defendants contained ex Iraqi President Saddam Hussein, Lebanon’s Hezbollah, Iran’s Supreme Leader Ali Khamenei – and the Taliban.

Halema Wali, CEO of Afghans for a Better Tomorrow, a US-based advocacy group, highlighted that the funds in the Afghan central bank belong to the people of Afghanistan, who are undergoing a threatening humanitarian situation.