For over a decade, wads of US cash packed into suitcases, backpacks and on occasion plastic shopping bags have been dropped off every month or so at the offices of Afghanistan’s president courtesy of the CIA.
According to a reported published in an American paper, millions of dollars have flowed from the CIA to the office of President Hamid Karzai.
“We called it ghost money,” said Khalil Rahman, who served as Karzai’s chief of staff from 2002 until 2005. “It came in secret, and it left in secret.”
The CIA, which declined to comment for this article, has long been known to support some relatives and close aides of Karzai.
However, the new accounts of off-the-books cash delivered directly to his office show payments on a vaster scale, and with a far greater impact on everyday governing.
