Acting Minister of Finance Met the World Bank Country Director for Afghanistan

Acting Minister of Finance met with H.E Henry Kerali, country director of World Bank for Afghanistan on May 11, 2020.

In the meeting, both parties’ technical teams were also present; the parties discussed the 400 Million USD grant to the Afghanistan government in the fight against coronavirus, in detail; as well as the government’s policies in this fight.

Country Director of the World Bank presented the technical details of the improvements the Afghanistan government has had; he added that since the Afghanistan government has completed some of their commitments, the World bank will transfer 200 Million USD of it in the next week to the government of Afghanistan; and the rest of this package will be transferred in due time. In addition, the World Bank’s Country Director for Afghanistan elaborated on the new programs to help Afghanistan National Budget, and added that the World Bank technical teams are working on them. He reported good progress of this work, and ensured that details of these works will be shared soon. Meanwhile, the parties discussed Afghanistan government’s policies in three sections: human resource and civil servants reform implementation; Ministry of Energy and Water’s division; and the division of Ministry of Mine and Petroleum; as well as the financial problems that Da Afghanistan Breshna Sherkat faces. The World Bank Country Director for Afghanistan emphasized that these reforms should be carried in a way to not undo the former commitments of Afghanistan.

“We are working with CSTC-A to cover the debt security authorities owe to DABS, and we will cover some of it via our National Budget; so we can pull out DABS out of this financial crisis”, said H.E Abdul Habib Zadran, DM Finance of MoF.

The World Bank Country Director for Afghanistan emphasized that ‘we are committed to work according to Afghanistan government’s priorities, and we will try to make our commitments feasible’.

Acting Minister of Finance expressed gratitude and mentioned that the World Bank has always been one of our best donors and has always coordinated its programs with the government of Afghanistan. ‘Afghanistan is committed to follow all the requirements of the WB, and we will work with line ministries to implement the conditions and in due time’ he added.

Acting Minister of Finance further explained that the reforms have been based on necessities of the government. Meanwhile, he added that ‘we will work with the line ministries and decide on the suggestions of the WB’.