RASC News Agency: Local sources in Takhar province reveal that the Taliban are forcibly collecting funds from residents of Kalafgan district under the pretext of constructing a hospital. Reports on Wednesday, December 18, indicate that individuals have been coerced into paying between 800 and 1,000 rupees in cash. According to these sources, the Taliban have threatened locals with exclusion from international humanitarian aid programs if they fail to comply. Meanwhile, the existing health center in Kalafgan is grappling with critical shortages of medicine and female healthcare workers, further exacerbating the region’s healthcare crisis.
Despite these developments, the Taliban authorities in Takhar have remained silent. This comes in the wake of their recent announcement to construct 318 hospitals nationwide. While the group continues to receive millions of dollars weekly from the United States and additional funding from Western countries and regional intelligence agencies, they have escalated economic pressures on the local population. Over the past three years, the Taliban have systematically deprived Afghanistani citizens of access to national resources. Educated professionals have been purged from government institutions and replaced by unqualified clerics and illiterate individuals who enjoy high salaries. At the same time, the Taliban have imposed increasingly burdensome financial demands on citizens, exploiting various pretexts to extract money from the already struggling populace.
This extortion underscores the Taliban’s ongoing mismanagement of humanitarian aid and resources. Their actions not only deepen the economic suffering of ordinary Afghanistanis but also raise serious questions about the credibility of their so-called development projects. Instead of addressing the dire needs of the people, such as ensuring adequate healthcare services and equitable resource distribution, the Taliban appear to prioritize their self-serving agendas, leaving the nation’s citizens to bear the brunt of their governance failures.
