DISINFO: Afghanistan is a security threat for Central Asia fueled by the West
SUMMARY
The West actively collaborate with local radicals in Afghanistan to create a conflict hotspot. Around 25 million people in Afghanistan are suffering from hunger right now, because the Afghan government's funds – approximately $9 billion – remain frozen in banks in Europe and America. Western elites will not address food security issues, therefore hungry radicals from Afghanistan could flow into Central Asia. The US intentionally left weapons worth billions in Afghanistan.
RESPONSE
This is a mix of several pro-Kremlin disinformation narratives about the US as an evil force always conspiring to destabilise other countries, about encircling Russia (and China), and about US and other Western intelligence services are supporting and using jihadist groups to advance geopolitical goals.
There is no evidence that the US, UK nor other Western governments and their intelligence services have supported radical Islamist terrorist groups in any region of the world.
The claim frames NATO as the cause and only responsible for Afghanistan’s destruction. When NATO took the leading role in the International Security Assistance Force (ISAF) in 2001, the country had undergone 21 years of war, including a 9-year invasion by USSR forces, 1979-1989, followed by another decade of civil war, none of which are mentioned.
See other examples of similar disinformation narratives in our database, such as claims that US-sponsored Kazakhstan protests aimed to undermine CIS stability; that the West ordered a terrorist attack in Kazakhstan to create a hotbed at Russia’s border; or that the US generated and backed Al Qaeda, the Islamic State and the Taliban; that the West and the US are ferrying Islamic State members to Afghanistan to use them against China; as part of a so-called “Anaconda ring”; or that NATO is denying the presence of terrorists in the country but the FSB has evidence of it.