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A group of Afghan nationals arrived in the Philippines on Monday to process special immigrant visas for their resettlement in the United States, as part of an agreement between Manila and Washington. The Philippines agreed last July to temporarily host a U.S. immigrant visa processing center for a limited number of Afghan nationals aspiring to resettle in America. Department of Foreign Affairs spokesperson Teresita Daza said the Afghan nationals who landed in the Philippines on Monday were provided entry visas. She said they had completed extensive security vetting and undergone full medical screenings prior to their arrival. The U.S. government will cover the costs for the Afghan nationals' stay in the Philippines, including their food, housing, security, medical and transportation expenses, she said. She didn't specify how many Afghans arrived or how long the visa processing will take. Under the Philippines' rules, visa applicants can stay for no longer than 59 days. A senior Philippine official told The Associated Press last year that only 150 to 300 applicants would be accommodated in the Philippines under the “one-time” deal. The official who had knowledge of the negotiations agreed to speak on condition of anonymity because of a lack of authority to speak publicly. The Afghan nationals seeking resettlement primarily worked for the U.S. government in Afghanistan or were deemed eligible for U.S. special immigrant visas but were left behind when Washington withdrew from the country and Taliban militants took back power in a chaotic period in 2021. Read: FS requests Canadian envoy to expedite visa processing for Bangladeshi nationals U.S. Secretary of State Antony Blinken first relayed the request to his Philippines counterpart in 2022, and President Joe Biden discussed the request with Philippines leader Ferdinand Marcos Jr. when he visited the U.S. last year, Philippine officials said. Marcos has rekindled relations with the U.S. since winning the presidency by a landslide margin two years ago. In February last year, he allowed an expansion of the American military presence under a 2014 defense agreement in a decision that upset China.

Sri Lanka outsmarted Afghanistan to win the opening match of the Super 4 stage by four wickets at the Asia Cup on Saturday. Danushka Gunathilaka (33) and Bhanuka Rajapaksa (31) profited from dropped catches to carry Sri Lanka to a winning 179-6 with five balls to spare and avenge a heavy loss to the Afghans in the group stage. Afghanistan, which was put in to bat, rode on opening batter Rahmanullah Gurbaz’s fabulous 84 off 45 balls before Sri Lanka pulled them back in the death overs to restrict them to 175-6. “We believe we can chase anything on these kinds of wickets,” Sri Lanka captain Dasun Shanaka said after his team’s second successive big chase. “There was a plan coming into this game … partnerships was the key.” Gurbaz was on 8 when Gunathilaka had him caught at the long-on boundary but video clearly showed the fielder pushed the boundary cushion with his back heel. The lapse cost Sri Lanka as Gurbaz notched his half-century off just 22 balls in a second-wicket stand of 93 with Ibrahim Zadran, who made a nearly run-a-ball 40. Read: Bangladesh bow out of Asia Cup, lose to Sri Lanka But Sri Lanka made a grand recovery in the death overs through fast bowler Asitha Fernando, who made his T20 debut against Bangladesh on Thursday, and offspinner Maheesh Theekshana. Fernando broke through in the 16th over when Gurbaz holed out at midwicket while looking for his seventh six of the innings, and Theekshana had Nabi caught off his own bowling in the penultimate over. Sri Lanka’s aggressive approach in the run chase paid dividends as Kusal Mendis (36) and Pathum Nissanka (35) provided a whirlwind start of 62 off 39 balls. Mendis hit two sixes against Rashid Khan in the powerplay as Afghanistan had to bring in its key spinner inside the first six overs. Rashid had a rare off day in a Twenty20; the legspinner conceded 39 runs off his four overs before clean bowling Gunathilaka in his last over. Both Sri Lanka openers perished in the space of three overs, but Gunathilaka and Rajapaksa continued to dominate. Afghanistan could have got Gunathilaka early but didn’t go for a television referral against Rashid’s sharp delivery before the left-hander was dropped at fine leg in Nabi’s next over. Rajapaksa was also let off when Samiullah Shinwari, playing his first T20 in 2 1/2 years, missed a sitter at deep cover after the batter hit fast bowler Naveen-ul-Haq for two fours and a six in the 16th over. “We were about 20-25 runs short, and also we didn’t field well or bowl in the right areas,” Nabi said. “It’s a better pitch today than the one we played on against Bangladesh … we dropped some catches which, if we took, the game would have been different.” India and Pakistan play their Super 4 opener on Sunday.  

Islamic countries scrambled on Sunday to find ways to help Afghanistan avert an imminent economic collapse they say would have a “horrendous” global impact. The hastily called meeting of the Organization of Islamic Cooperation in Islamabad ended with a promise to set up a fund to provide humanitarian aid through the Islamic Development Bank, which would provide a cover for countries to donate without dealing directly with the country's Taliban rulers. In a press conference at the end of the summit, Pakistan's Foreign Minister Shah Mahmood Qureshi also described what he called good news from the United States, whose special representative on Afghanistan, Tom West, attended the summit. He said West met with the Taliban delegation led by the interim foreign minister Amir Khan Muttaqi on the sidelines. Qureshi said West also said he was mandated to “engage ” with the Taliban, that U.S. humanitarian aid to Afghanistan would not carry preconditions and there could be as much as $1.2 billion available through the World Bank in money that could be released to Afghanistan. There was no immediate response from the U.S. to Qureshi's statements. There has been a growing call for the U.S. and other countries to release upward of $10 billion in frozen Afghan assets. However, previously the U.S. has said at least some of that money is tied up in litigation involving the survivors and the families of victims of the 9/11 terrorist attacks carried out by al Qaida while being harbored in Afghanistan by the Taliban during their previous rule. Sunday's summit brought together dozens of foreign ministers as well as the special representatives on Afghanistan of major powers, including China, the U.S. and Russia. It also included the U.N. undersecretary general on humanitarian affairs, and the president of the Islamic Development Bank Muhammad Sulaiman Al Jasser, who offered several concrete financing proposals. He said the IDB can manage trusts that could be used to move money into Afghanistan, jumpstart businesses and help salvage the deeply troubled economy. At the outset of the summit, several participating nations called for a quick opening of the country's banking system and collectively, with the United Nations and international banking institutions, to provide assistance to Afghanistan. Pakistan's Prime Minister Imran Khan directed his remarks to the U.S., urging Washington to drop preconditions for releasing desperately needed funds and restarting Afghanistan's banking systems. Khan seemed to offer Taliban a pass on their limits on education for girls, urging the world to understand “cultural sensitivities” and saying human rights and women's rights meant different things in different countries. Still other speakers, including the OIC chairman Hussain Ibrahim Taha, emphasized the need for the protection of human rights, particularly those of women and girls. “This gathering is about the Afghan people,” said Qureshi, who warned that without immediate aid, Afghanistan was certain to collapse. The consequences would be “horrendous," he said, not just in Afghan lives lost to starvation and disease — but also what would most certainly create a mass exodus of Afghans. He predicted chaos would spread, allowing terrorism and the drug trade to flourish. Martin Griffiths, the U.N. undersecretary for humanitarian affairs and emergency relief coordinator, warned that Afghanistan cannot survive on donations alone. He urged donor countries to show flexibility, allowing their money to pay salaries of public sector workers and support “basic services such as health, education, electricity, livelihoods, to allow the people of Afghanistan some chance to get through this winter and some encouragement to remain home with their families." Beyond that, Griffiths said, “we need constructive engagement with the de facto authorities to clarify what we expect from each other.” Afghanistan’s teetering economy, he added, requires decisive and compassionate action, or "I fear that this fall will pull down the entire population." Griffiths said families simply do not have the cash for everyday purchases like food and fuel, as prices soar. The cost of fuel is up by around 40%, and most families spend 80% of their money just to buy food. He rattled off a number of stark statistics. “Universal poverty may reach 97% of the population of Afghanistan. That could be the next grim milestone,” he warned. “Within a year, 30% of Afghanistan’s GDP (gross domestic product) could be lost altogether, while male unemployment may double to 29%." Next year the U.N. would be asking for $4.5 billion in aid for Afghanistan — it's single largest humanitarian aid request, he said. In what appeared to be a message to the Taliban delegation, Qureshi and subsequent speakers, including Taha, emphasized the protection of human rights, particularly those of women and girls. In an interview with The Associated Press last week, Muttaqi said that Afghanistan’s new rulers were committed to the education of girls and women in the workforce. Yet four months into Taliban rule, girls are not allowed to attend high school in most provinces, and though women have returned to their jobs in much of the health care sector, many female civil servants have been barred from coming to work. At the summit's conclusion Qureshi said the OIC agreed to appoint a special representative on Afghanistan. The 20 foreign ministers and 10 deputy foreign ministers in attendance also agreed to establish a greater partnership with the United Nations to get help to desperate Afghans. They participants also emphasized the critical need to open Afghanistan’s banking facilities, which have been largely closed since the Taliban takeover on Aug. 15. The Taliban has limited withdrawals from the country’s banks to $200 a month. “We collectively feel that we have to unlock the financial and banking channels because the economy cannot function and people cannot be held without banking services,” Qureshi said.

Refugee admissions to the United States fell to a record low during the 2021 budget year, despite President Joe Biden's pledge to reverse the sharp cuts made by the Trump administration, according to figures obtained by The Associated Press. A total of 11,445 refugees were allowed into the United States during the budget year that ended on Thursday, according to a person with access to the information who spoke on condition of anonymity because they were not authorized to release the figure. That number does not include the tens of thousands of Afghans brought to the United States as American troops withdrew from Afghanistan, ending the 20-year war there. Many of those Afghans were allowed into the country under a different legal status known as humanitarian parole, which is why they are not included in the refugee tally. Read: Libya’s migrant roundup reaches 4,000 amid major crackdown Still the number highlights Biden's challenges in reversing the restrictive refugee policies set by former President Donald Trump's administration, which targeted the program as part of a broader campaign to slash both legal and illegal immigration to the United States. The U.S. president determines the cap on refugee admissions each budget year, which runs from Oct. 1 to Sept. 30. Biden didn't take office until almost four months after the last fiscal year began. The State Department did not immediately respond to a request for comment about the number. The 11,445 refugee admissions total falls far below the nation’s cap of 62,500 for the 2021 budget year that Biden set in May. It's also below the record-low ceiling of 15,000 that Trump had initially set for the year. Biden initially indicated he would not override the 15,000-person cap, saying in an emergency determination that it “remains justified by humanitarian concerns and is otherwise in the national interest." But that brought sharp rebuke from Democratic allies who criticized him for not taking the symbolic step of authorizing more refugees this year. The White House quickly reversed course and raised the cap, though Biden said at the time that he did not expect the U.S. would meet the new 62,500 ceiling with only four months left in the 2021 budget year, given the ongoing restrictions put in place due to the coronavirus pandemic and work the administration says is needed to rebuild the program. Refugee advocates said the record-low number reflects the damage done by the Trump administration to the program. Before the 2021 budget year, the lowest number of refugees allowed in was during the 2020 budget year when the number hit 11,814. The historical yearly average was 95,000 under previous Republican and Democratic administrations. The Biden administration has expanded the narrow eligibility criteria put in place by his predecessor that had kept out most refugees, among other steps. But critics say it's not enough and that the Biden administration has moved too slowly. It remains to be seen whether refugee admissions will reach anywhere near the 125,000 cap that Biden has set for the current budget year, which started Friday. Read:Many migrants staying in US even as expulsion flights rise Krish O’Mara Vignarajah, president of the Lutheran Immigration and Refugee Service, one of nine U.S. agencies working to resettle refugees, said efforts need to be accelerated to add personnel overseas, do more remote interviews and relieve the enormous backlog of refugee applications. She said that while the program was gutted by the Trump administration, it is now Biden's responsibility to revive it. “If we are to reach President Biden’s goal of welcoming 125,000 refugees, the administration must be aggressive and innovative in ramping up processing," she said in a statement. Mark Hetfield of HIAS, another resettlement agency, agreed that Biden “should have done better." “What this record low number really shows ... is that the administration needs to remove the red tape and other obstacles that hinder the resettlement program from effectively responding to emergencies like Afghanistan," he said. Biden, who co-sponsored legislation creating the refugee program in 1980, has said reopening the door to refugees is “how we will restore the soul of our nation.”

The Biden administration on Friday provided the first public look inside a U.S. military base where Afghans airlifted out of Afghanistan are being screened, amid questions about how the government is caring for the refugees and vetting them. “Every Afghan who is here with us has endured a harrowing journey and they are now faced with the very real challenges of acclimating with life in the United States,” Liz Gracon, a senior State Department official, told reporters. The three-hour tour at Fort Bliss Army base in El Paso, Texas, was the first time the media has been granted broad access to one of the eight U.S. military installations housing Afghans. But even so, reporters, including those with The Associated Press, were not allowed to talk with any evacuees or spend more than a few minutes in areas where they were gathered, with military officials citing “privacy concerns.” Nearly 10,000 Afghan evacuees are staying at the base while they undergo medical and security checks before being resettled in the United States. The operation was described by officials at the Department of Homeland Security and Department of State as a “historic” and “unprecedented” effort to facilitate the relocation of a huge number of refugees in less than a month’s time. On Friday, Afghan children with soccer balls and basketballs played outside large white tents. Families walked down a dirt driveway with stacks of plastic food containers piled under their chins and Coca-Cola cans under their arms. One young girl, still wearing dirty clothing, cried in the middle of the road after her food spilled and soldiers attempted to help her. Inside the containers, which refugees had spent around 15 minutes in line for in the blistering sun, were traditional Afghan meals of basmati rice and hearty stew. READ: Afghans face hunger crisis, adding to Taliban’s challenges The U.S. government spent two weeks building what it calls a village to house the Afghans on the base. It is a sprawling area with scores of air-conditioned tents used as dormitories and dining halls on scrubby dirt lots, a landscape that in some ways resembled parts of the homeland they fled. Under the program called “Operation Allies Welcome,” some 50,000 Afghans are expected to be admitted to the United States, including translators, drivers and others who helped the U.S. military during the 20-year war and who feared reprisals by the Taliban after they quickly seized power last month. Nearly 130,000 were airlifted out of Afghanistan in one of the largest mass evacuations in U.S. history. Many of those people are still in transit, undergoing security vetting and screening in other countries, including Germany, Spain, Kuwait and Qatar. Members of Congress have questioned whether the screening is thorough enough. Many of the Afghans who worked for the U.S. government have undergone years of vetting already before they were hired, and then again to apply for a special immigrant visa for U.S. allies. After they are released from the base, they will be aided by resettlement agencies in charge of placing the refugees. The agencies give priority to places where the refugees either have family already in the United States or there are Afghan immigrant communities with the resources to help them start a new life in a foreign land. Those with American citizenship or green cards are able to leave once arriving at the base, according to a State Department representative. If other evacuees — whose release is dependent on completing health protocols mandated by the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention — choose to leave prior to the full resettlement period, that may be used against them. So far, no one at Fort Bliss has been released for resettlement. The Pentagon has said all evacuees are tested for COVID-19 upon arriving at Dulles International Airport outside Washington. READ: As US military leaves Kabul, many Americans, Afghans remain The Biden administration is also using the base to house thousands of immigrant children, mostly from Central America, who have been crossing the U.S.-Mexico border in record numbers on their own, without adults. The children are housed there until they can be reunited with relatives already in the United States or with a sponsor, usually a family friend, or sent to a licensed facility.

Afghan protesters defied the Taliban for a second day Thursday, waving their national flag in scattered demonstrations, and the fighters again responded violently as they faced down growing challenges to their rule. A U.N. official warned of dire food shortages and experts said the country was severely in need of cash while noting that the Taliban are unlikely to enjoy the generous international aid that the civilian government they dethroned did. In light of these challenges, the Taliban have moved quickly to suppress any dissent, despite their promises that they have become more moderate since they last ruled Afghanistan with draconian laws. Many fear they will succeed in erasing two decades of efforts to expand women’s and human rights and remake the country. On Thursday, a procession of cars and people near Kabul’s airport carried long black, red and green banners in honor of the Afghan flag — a banner that is becoming a symbol of defiance. At another protest in Nangarhar province, video posted online showed a bleeding demonstrator with a gunshot wound. Onlookers tried to carry him away. Also read: Pakistan, U.S. speak on Afghanistan's future In Khost province, Taliban authorities instituted a 24-hour curfew Thursday after violently breaking up another protest, according to information obtained by journalists monitoring from abroad. The authorities did not immediately acknowledge the demonstration or the curfew. Protesters also took the streets in Kunar province, according to witnesses and social media videos that lined up with reporting by The Associated Press. The demonstrations — which come as Afghans celebrated Independence Day and some commemorated the Shiite Ashoura festival — were a remarkable show of defiance after the Taliban fighters violently dispersed a protest Wednesday. At that rally, in the eastern city of Jalalabad, demonstrators lowered the Taliban’s flag and replace it with Afghanistan’s tricolor. At least one person was killed. Also read: Chaos as thousands flee Afghanistan after Taliban takeover Meanwhile, opposition figures gathering in the last area of the country not under Taliban rule talked of launching an armed resistance under the banner of the Northern Alliance, which allied with the U.S. during the 2001 invasion. It was not clear how serious a threat they posed given that Taliban fighters overran nearly the entire country in a matter of days with little resistance from Afghan forces. The Taliban so far have offered no specifics on how they will lead, other than to say they will be guided by Shariah, or Islamic, law. They are in talks with senior officials of previous Afghan governments. But they face an increasingly precarious situation. “A humanitarian crisis of incredible proportions is unfolding before our eyes,” warned Mary Ellen McGroarty, the head of the U.N.’s World Food Program in Afghanistan. Beyond the difficulties of bringing in food to the landlocked nation dependent on imports, she said that drought has seen over 40% of the country’s crop lost. Many who fled the Taliban advance now live in parks and open spaces in Kabul. “This is really Afghanistan’s hour of greatest need, and we urge the international community to stand by the Afghan people at this time,” she said. Hafiz Ahmad, a shopkeeper in Kabul, said some food has flowed into the capital, but prices have gone up. He hesitated to pass those costs onto his customers but said he had to. “It is better to have it,” he said. “If there were nothing, then that would be even worse.” Two of Afghanistan’s key border crossings with Pakistan are now open for trade. However, traders still fear insecurity on the roads and confusion over customs duties that could push them to price their goods higher. Amid that uncertainty and concerns that the Taliban will reimpose a brutal rule, which included largely confining women to their homes and holding public executions, many Afghans are trying to flee the country. At Kabul’s international airport, military evacuation flights continued, but access to the airport remained difficult. On Thursday, Taliban fighters fired into the air to try to control the crowds gathered at the airport’s blast walls. After a chaotic start that saw people rush the runway and cling to a plane taking off, the U.S. military is ramping up evacuations and now has enough aircraft to get 5,000 to 9,000 people out a day, Army Maj. Gen. Hank Taylor said Thursday. Overnight, President Joe Biden said that he was committed to keeping U.S. troops in Afghanistan until every American is evacuated, even if that means maintaining a military presence there beyond his Aug. 31 deadline for withdrawal. In an interview with ABC’s “Good Morning America,” Biden said he didn’t believe the Taliban had changed. “I think they’re going through sort of an existential crisis about do they want to be recognized by the international community as being a legitimate government,” Biden said. “I’m not sure they do.” Indirectly acknowledging the resistance they face, the Taliban on Thursday asked preachers to urge congregants to remain in the country and counter “negative propaganda” against them. The Taliban have also urged people to return to work, but most government officials remain in hiding or are themselves attempting to flee. The head of the country’s Central Bank warned that the supply of physical U.S. dollars is “close to zero,” which will batter the currency, the afghani. The U.S. has apparently frozen the country’s foreign reserves, and the International Monetary Fund cut off access to loans or other resources for now. “The afghani has been defended by literally planeloads of U.S. dollars landing in Kabul on a very regular basis, sometimes weekly,” said Graeme Smith, a consultant researcher with the Overseas Development Institute. “If the Taliban don’t get cash infusions soon to defend the afghani, I think there’s a real risk of a currency devaluation that makes it hard to buy bread on the streets of Kabul for ordinary people.” Still, Smith, who has written a book on Afghanistan, said the Taliban likely won’t ask for the same billions in international aid sought by the country’s fallen civilian government — large portions of which were siphoned off by corruption. That could limit the power of the international community’s threat of sanctions. “You’re much more likely to see the Taliban positioning themselves as sort of gatekeepers to the international community as opposed to coming begging for billions of dollars,” he said. There has been no armed opposition to the Taliban. But videos from the Panjshir Valley north of Kabul, a stronghold of the Northern Alliance militias that allied with the U.S. during the 2001 invasion of Afghanistan, appear to show potential opposition figures gathering there. Those figures include members of the deposed government — Vice President Amrullah Saleh, who asserted on Twitter that he is the country’s rightful president, and Defense Minister Gen. Bismillah Mohammadi — as well as Ahmad Massoud, the son of the slain Northern Alliance leader Ahmad Shah Massoud. In an opinion piece published by The Washington Post, Massoud asked for weapons and aid to fight the Taliban. “I write from the Panjshir Valley today, ready to follow in my father’s footsteps, with mujahideen fighters who are prepared to once again take on the Taliban,” he wrote.

The beating blades of US military helicopters whisking American diplomats to Kabul's airport Sunday punctuated a frantic rush by thousands of other foreigners and Afghans to flee to safety as well, as a stunningly swift Taliban takeover entered the heart of Afghanistan's capital Kabul. Two weeks from the Biden administration's planned full military withdrawal, the US was pouring thousands of fresh troops back into the country temporarily to safeguard what was gearing up to be a large-scale airlift. Shortly before dawn Monday Kabul time, State Department spokesman Ned Price announced the US had completed the evacuation of its embassy in Afghanistan, lowering the American flag. At the same time, the administration announced it was taking over air traffic control at Kabul's international airport, to manage the airlifts. Sporadic gunfire there Sunday frightened Afghan families fearful of Taliban rule and desperate for flights out, one of the last avenues for escape in an evacuation made far more urgent by the Taliban's weeklong sweep across the country. NATO allies that had pulled out their forces ahead of the Biden administration's intended August 31 withdrawal deadline were sending troops back in as well this weekend to protect evacuations of their own. Some complained the US was failing to move fast enough to bring to safety Afghans at risk of reprisal from the Taliban for past work with the Americans and other NATO forces. "This is murder by incompetence," said US Air Force veteran Sam Lerman, struggling Sunday from his home in Woodbridge, Virginia, to find a way out for an Afghan contractor who had guarded Americans and other NATO forces at Afghanistan's Bagram air base for a decade. Taliban forces moved early Sunday into a capital beset by fear and declared they were awaiting a peaceful surrender. READ: Australia sends jets to fly personnel from Kabul That arrival of the first waves of Taliban into Kabul prompted the US to begin evacuating the embassy building in full, leaving only acting ambassador Ross Wilson and a core of other diplomats operating at the airport. Even as CH-47 helicopters shuttled American diplomats to the airport, and facing criticism at home over the administration's handling of the withdrawal, Secretary of State Antony Blinken rejected comparisons to the 1975 fall of Saigon. A joint statement from the US State and Defense departments pledged late Sunday to fly thousands of Americans, local embassy staff and other "particularly vulnerable Afghan nationals" out of the country. It gave no details, but high-profile Afghan women, journalists, and Afghans who have worked with Western governments and nonprofits are among those who most fear Taliban targeting for perceived Western ways or ties. The statement promised to speed up visa processing for Afghans who used to work with American troops and officials in particular. To many, the evacuations, and last-ditch rescue attempts by Americans and other foreigners trying to save Afghan allies, appeared far from orderly. Hundreds or more Afghans crowded in a part of Kabul airport away from many of the evacuating Westerners. Some of them, including a man with a broken leg sitting on the ground, lined up for what was expected to be the last flight out by the country's Ariana Airlines. US officials reported gunfire near the airport Sunday evening and for a time urged civilians to stop coming. Pentagon spokesman John Kirby said the airport was open for commercial flights – the only escape left for many ordinary Afghans – but would experience stoppages. READ: Afghan president flees the country as Taliban move on Kabul US C-17 transport planes were due to bring thousands of fresh American troops to the airport, then fly out again with evacuating US Embassy staffers. The Pentagon was now sending an additional 1,000 troops, bringing the total number to about 6,000, a US defence official said Sunday, speaking on condition of anonymity to discuss a deployment decision not yet announced by the Pentagon. The Pentagon intends to have enough aircraft to fly out as many as 5,000 civilians a day, both Americans and the Afghan translators and others who worked with the US during the war. It was by no means clear how long Kabul's deteriorating security would allow any evacuations to continue.

After decades of conflict, Afghanistan’s warring sides will open long anticipated negotiations Saturday in search of a lasting peace, reports AP.

Afghanistan will need vast amounts of foreign funding to keep its government afloat through 2024, a U.S. agency said Friday, even as foreign donors are increasingly angry over the cost of debilitating corruption and the U.S. seeks a peace deal with Taliban to withdraw its troops from the country.