A monitoring report presented to the US Congress warned that Afghanistan, which suffers from a weak health care system, malnutrition and war, and other vulnerabilities, is likely facing a "health catastrophe" due to the Corona virus.

The report, released on Thursday evening, Inspector General of Afghanistan Reconstruction, John Sobko, may stoke concerns among officials and members of the US Congress that the epidemic threatens US-led peace efforts.

The report said that the spread of "Covid-19" had already severely affected Afghanistan, from the complexity of the peace initiative, to causing the closure of border crossings, which disrupted commercial and humanitarian operations.

The report added: "The many weaknesses, and in some unique cases in Afghanistan, the weakness of the health care system, the prevalence of malnutrition, the ease of penetration of borders, massive internal displacement, neighboring Iran, and the continuation of the conflict, make it more likely that the country faces a health disaster in the coming months." .

In a message accompanying the report, Sobko said that high food prices in the poor country would likely exacerbate the crisis.

As the pandemic spreads, Washington is pressuring the Taliban and Afghan President Ashraf Ghani to release thousands of prisoners threatened by the virus, ahead of peace talks that were scheduled to start on March 10.

But Kabul was not a party to the February 29 withdrawal of US forces from Washington and the Taliban, which demanded the release of the prisoners. Disagreements over the pace and number of prisoners released contributed to the stalling peace efforts, which could face a major setback, if a large number of prisoners died.

Local news reports quoted the Ministry of Health as saying that Afghanistan confirmed approximately 2,200 cases of Coronavirus and 64 deaths. The report stated that the international coalition, led by NATO, refrained from publishing data on the number of attacks carried out by the "Taliban" in the first three months of 2020. The report indicated that this is the first time that the publication of data has been prohibited, since the Inspector General began For the reconstruction of Afghanistan use to monitor levels of violence and its locations in 2018.

He added that the coalition interpreted this as "now an important part" of the US government's internal consultations on negotiations with the "Taliban", which have stepped up attacks against Afghan security forces, since the February 29 agreement. The report said that the US Department of Defense stated that it is possible to resume publication of the data, once these consultations are completed.

The "Covid-19" outbreak had already severely affected Afghanistan, from the complexity of the peace initiative, to causing the closure of border crossings.

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