More than 500,000 children in Afghanistan are at risk of malnutrition this year, the United Nations (UN) warned on Wednesday.
As one of the reasons for this alarming situation, the UN cites extreme climatic conditions that “limited the ability of people to feed their families”.
According to the latest report by the UN Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs (OCHA), almost half of Afghanistan’s population, about 22.9 million people, will need humanitarian assistance this year to address chronic and acute needs.
Afghanistan’s fragile economy, natural disasters and shocks caused by climate change, and political instability in the country and the region stand in the way of recovery from decades of conflict, the report said.
Since the Islamist Taliban retook power in the country in August 2021, Afghanistan has had no access to its foreign currency in Western banks, further exacerbating the country’s economic crisis. Unemployment and the poverty rate affect about 48 percent of the population, warns the UN.
The country is highly vulnerable to climate-related disasters. In 2025, even more devastating floods than previous ones are expected, destroying large numbers of homes and farmland and displacing communities.
In August 2023, the Taliban demanded the return of $7 billion from the Central Bank of Afghanistan frozen abroad.
