With the collapse of the government in Afghanistan, development aid also initially lost its feet. German government and non-governmental organizations have been involved in Afghanistan for more than half a century. No country has received more funds from the budget of the Federal Ministry for Economic Cooperation and Development (BMZ) in the past 20 years. In the current budget, 375 million euros were earmarked for around 40 projects. According to unconfirmed estimates, around 2,500 people recently worked in Afghanistan on behalf of the state society for international cooperation (GIZ) or for non-governmental organizations such as Welthungerhilfe, Miserior, Caritas or Doctors Without Borders. Some of them fled to Kabul, others duck away at first,some continue.
Peter Carstens
Political correspondent in Berlin
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Even before the Taliban's military victory, millions of Afghans were living in the most difficult circumstances: a lack of harvests due to the persistent drought, the uncontrolled coronavirus, a massive refugee movement, including in the interior of the country.
According to the latest information from the International Rescue Committee Germany, 18.9 million Afghans are already dependent on humanitarian aid.
The director of the organization warned: "The military withdrawal from Afghanistan must not be accompanied by a humanitarian, political and diplomatic withdrawal."
So far, Afghanistan has received around 450 million euros from Germany every year for civil projects. The Federal Republic was the second largest donor after the United States. Cooperation with the government in Kabul had been difficult for a long time. This was mainly due to the enormous corruption in government circles. When the Afghan Foreign Minister Salahuddin Rabbani last visited Development Minister Gerd Müller (CSU) in June 2019, Müller openly threatened him with cuts. That has changed just as little as all the previous reminders. The Afghan government was considered one of the most corrupt on earth, even if it is not true that the ousted President Ashraf Ghani took 169 million dollars with him out of the country, which he denies. That he flew to the Emirates "only with slippers on"hard to believe.
Soldiers and civilians worked together
The commitment therefore concentrated on the northern regions, where projects with around 1,300 Afghan employees and around two dozen employees from Germany and other countries were running until recently.
The projects helped, for example, to improve the local infrastructure, promoted school and vocational training as well as women's rights, for example in the judiciary.
But there were also climate projects such as the “restoration of forest landscapes in five Afghan provinces” or projects to integrate refugees.
Afghanistan, a country with a civil war, was the first example of a "networked approach" since 2009, in which the Foreign Office, development aid and the armed forces should no longer work side by side but with each other. For general benefit. On the one hand, the development workers were able to benefit from the protection provided by the Bundeswehr. On the other hand, civil cooperation with Afghans in terms of governance, business and infrastructure created a benevolent civil society environment, which indirectly also meant more security for the Bundeswehr.