State Dept Withholding Evidence on Afghanistan Withdrawal

The chief watchdog for U.S. activities in Afghanistan is accusing the State Department of “unreasonably” withholding information about the Biden administration’s botched U.S. withdrawal from that war-torn country and its consequences since.John Sopko, the Special Inspector General for Afghanistan Reconstruction, sent a letter last week to Congress raising his concerns that State and its foreign aid arm, the U.S. Agency for International Development (USAID) were “coordinating to obstruct” his office’s audit and investigative work.
State and USAID are “unreasonably refusing to provide information and assistance requested by SIGAR” and “now appear to have adopted a premeditated position of obstruction,” Sopko wrote in the letter, which also was sent to Secretary of State Antony Blinken and USAID Administrator Samantha Power.
Sopko’s team has been investigating the collapse of the U.S.-backed government of Afghan President Ashraf Ghani to the Taliban as U.S. troops were withdrawing last summer, State and USAID’s compliance with laws and regulations regarding the prohibition of transferr …

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