BERLIN, March 27 (UPI) -- While Afghanistan is in dire need of monetary support, Western powers are not delivering their promised aid, a report found.
Up to $10 billion, or 40 percent, of the entire aid promised to Afghanistan has not been delivered, thus jeopardizing economic progress and security in the country, according to a report entitled "Falling Short," published by the Agency Coordinating Body for Afghan Relief, the umbrella group of 94 aid organizations working in Afghanistan.
The United States -- the biggest international donor to Afghanistan -- "has one of the biggest shortfalls," providing only half of the $10.4 billion pledged until 2008, said Matt Waldman, an expert from British charity Oxfam and the report's author.
The European Commission and Germany have delivered less than two-thirds of their respective $1.7 billion and $1.2 billion pledges, with the World Bank only providing little more than half, the report said. When aid wasn't insufficient, it was often "wasteful and ineffective." Only Japan and Canada were praised for best meeting their promises. The report estimates that roughly 90 percent of Afghanistan's public spending is shouldered with international aid money. The government in Kabul agreed with most of the report's conclusions.
All four powers have since denied having fallen behind when it comes to providing aid.
The U.S. Agency for International Development assured that its assistance to Afghanistan was on track, and in Germany, Development Minister Heidemarie Wieczorek-Zeul said her government is "carefully delivering all of (the) promised aid" and has so far paid 90 percent of the money pledged until 2006.
The World Bank in a statement said the report contains "incorrect data," adding that the bank was "fully up to date on its pledges to Afghanistan."
The European Commission also denied that promised aid was not being sent to Afghanistan.
"We are delivering -- there is no delay, no backlog, no shortfall or lagging behind," a Commission spokeswoman said. She admitted, however, that a part of the delivered money was being paid to foreign consultants.
The report said that of the delivered aid, "just $15 billion in aid has so far been spent, of which it is estimated a staggering 40 percent has returned to donor countries in corporate profits and consultant salaries … vastly pushing up expenditures."
Consultant salaries in Afghanistan can easily reach up to $500,000 a year due to living allowances and security benefits. The report also charged Western powers with wasteful practices when it comes to rebuilding Afghanistan's infrastructure.
"For example, a road between the center of Kabul and the international airport cost the United States more than $2.3 million per kilometer, at least four times the average cost of building a road in Afghanistan," the report found.
Afghanistan received just $57 per capita in aid in the two years after the international intervention in 2001 that toppled the Taliban, compared with $679 a head in Bosnia, ACBAR said. Some of the shortfalls, however, could be attributed to "challenging operating conditions, high levels of corruption and weak absorption capacities," it added.
However, those hurdles must be cleared to reduce the extreme poverty from which people are still suffering in the war-torn country, Waldman said.
"Aid must address Afghan needs, build local capacities and help Afghans help themselves," he said.
