RASC News Agency: Former U.S. President Donald Trump has labeled the Taliban as the world’s largest illegal arms dealer. On Monday evening August 12, during a public discussion on the “Spaces” platform of the social media network X, Trump sharply criticized the policies of current U.S. President Joe Biden regarding the Taliban. He asserted that Biden is aligned with the Taliban, yet the Taliban have become the most significant illegal arms dealer in the world—a development that is deeply troubling.
The Republican Party’s nominee for the upcoming U.S. presidential election described the transfer of Afghanistan funds to the Taliban as “the greatest folly in American history.” Trump’s remark seemingly refers to Afghanistan’s foreign reserves, which are currently held in a Swiss bank under the supervision of the Afghanistan Trust Fund, and remain inaccessible to the Taliban. Trump has previously claimed numerous times that the Biden administration left behind approximately $85 billion worth of U.S. military equipment in Afghanistan, which subsequently fell into Taliban hands. He has consistently described this decision by Biden as absurd.
Speaking at the Republican National Convention, where he officially accepted the party’s nomination for the presidential election, Trump asserted that the Taliban, by selling these weapons, have become the world’s largest dealer of American arms. The former U.S. president did not specify which countries or groups the Taliban are allegedly selling these American weapons to. However, earlier reports have indicated that American arms, previously held by the Afghanistan National Defense and Security Forces, have surfaced in Pakistan, Kashmir, and even Palestine.
American forces withdrew from Afghanistan in September 2021, following the signing of the Doha Agreement on February 29, 2020. This agreement was negotiated by Trump’s administration with the Taliban but was ultimately implemented during Biden’s presidency.
