Devex Newswire: The threat to aid workers under the Taliban

As the evacuation from Kabul continues, fears are growing for Afghans who worked on development projects in the country — some of whom have already been targeted by the Taliban.

With the Taliban now in control of the country, thousands of Afghans who worked with development organizations funded by international donors are believed to be at severe risk because of their perceived association with Western countries.

The U.K.’s current Afghan Relocation and Assistance Policy is often no help to them — it excludes those employed by subcontractors, as many Afghan aid workers are. While the U.K. government announced a new resettlement scheme for Afghan refugees overnight, there is as yet no indication the government will expand ARAP to include development workers.

Daniel Pimlott, director at Adam Smith International, a development consultancy that worked in Afghanistan between 2002 and 2018, tells Devex:

• “I’ve had many cases of people saying they face specific threats because they worked on projects funded by the U.K. government … [The Taliban] are hunting people down … because anyone who worked on a foreign-funded project is at risk and is seen as an agent of the [United States].”

• “When our staff have applied to [the] ARAP scheme, they have been rejected on an ... automated basis because the paperwork doesn’t allow you to apply if [you’re] working on a U.K. aid-funded project.”

Female activists who worked to advance women’s rights over the past two decades are also at particular risk, according to a letter by Women for Women International and Gender Action for Peace and Security — which calls for the ARAP scheme to be expanded to include such activists.

Read: Afghan aid workers targeted by Taliban but excluded from UK evacuation 

+ Devex is following the story of Afghan aid workers unable to apply for relocation. If you have any further information on this, drop me a line at william.worley@devex.com 

Follow the money

While dwarfed by military spending, incredible amounts of official development assistance were spent in Afghanistan over the past decade. A total of $50 billion made its way to the country between 2010 and 2019. Devex’s data team analyzed its top donors — and focused more specifically on gender equality funding, given ongoing questions about how those projects may be affected by the Taliban takeover.

Despite declining international interest in the country in recent years, aid to Afghanistan actually increased in 2019: It was the fourth-largest recipient of ODA in 2019 after Syria, Ethiopia, and Bangladesh, at $4.1 billion — a 13% increase from 2018.

Read: Afghanistan's top aid donors and how much was spent for gender equality

Afghanistan’s top 10 development aid donors from 2010 to 2019.

Common ground

While Afghanistan and Haiti appear to be totally separate crises with different causes, Cherubin argues that in both countries the international community has failed to support the formation of accountable, functional governments — which would have been key to solving both situations.

WASHing up

You’d be forgiven for forgetting in recent days that there was a pandemic still gripping the world, given all the events described above. But COVID-19 rages on, and one of the most effective weapons against it is also one of the most basic: water, sanitation, and hygiene.

Despite its importance, WASH is “often an afterthought even though it’s like the ground floor of everything,” says John Sauer, senior technical adviser on WASH at Population Services International. He shares practical, actionable tips with Rebecca Root for improving WASH in health care facilities.

Read: Practical tips for improving WASH in health care facilities 

In other news

The death toll in Haiti’s earthquake has climbed to 1,941 people, with nearly 10,000 injured, and rescue work hampered by heavy rains brought this week by Tropical Storm Grace. [BBC]

The EU is suspending development payments to Afghanistan until it can speak with the Taliban, the bloc's top diplomat has said. [Euronews]

India administered nearly 9 million COVID-19 vaccine doses in 24 hours this week, as new infections drop to their lowest levels since March. [Al Jazeera]

Sign up to Newswire for an inside look at the biggest stories in global development.