Afghanistan is currently experiencing “one of the worst humanitarian crises” ever, according to a report by the Islamic Relief Organization.
Afghans, particularly women and children, are suffering the most from an economic collapse, as a result of the combined effects of years of violence, maladministration, drought, natural disasters, and international sanctions.
In a report released on Saturday, the 13th of August, the Islamic Relief Organization stated that due to Afghanistan’s recent political and economic breakdown, a humanitarian disaster has become a reality.
At least 24 million Afghan people, or more than half the population of the country, immediately require humanitarian assistance.
The number of Afghan people who go to bed hungry every day is 19.7 million, which is one of the greatest figures ever recorded for a single country, according to the report.
The majority of all rural households and more than a quarter of urban households have now used all available resources, and they are turning to ever-distressing and dangerous measures.
That includes beggaring on the streets, selling their homes, selling their body organs, looking to take on increasingly risky work, or marrying off their young daughters to get a dowry for survival.
Behind these shocking statistics are real people. Every day, Islamic Relief teams on the ground meet mothers taking on crippling levels of debt so their children can eat one small meal a day, and fathers desperately searching for jobs that have disappeared. We meet boys dropping out of school to try to earn a few pennies to support their families, and young girls being married off as their parents can’t afford to feed them.
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This occurs as the previously acknowledged former government in Afghanistan has been overthrown by the cash-strapped Taliban, and as international sanctions, including the freezing of the country’s foreign reserves, worsen the country’s already precarious economic situation.
