World Bank Resumes Payments for Previous Afghanistan Projects.
The World Bank has resumed payments for Afghanistan’s previous development projects. The Taliban’s Ministry of Finance announced that the World Bank has begun the process of repaying approximately $45 million related to projects and companies whose documentation had been completed before the Taliban came to power.
According to the ministry, these payments are carried out after review and finalization of the documents by the World Bank’s oversight team in coordination with the Ministry of Finance.
In the first phase, $9.2 million was directly paid by the World Bank to foreign contracting companies. The second phase, currently underway, involves the disbursement of $18.8 million to contracting companies through the Ministry of Finance.
Officials stated that the third and fourth phases of payments will be implemented soon. The World Bank’s office in Afghanistan had been closed following the Taliban’s return in 2021.
However, in the winter of 2023, the institution announced that it would allocate around $300 million through UN agencies to provide essential services in Afghanistan. World Bank officials have stated that since 2021, the organization has provided a total of $2.2 billion to Afghanistan.
