Evaluation of Afghanistan's legislative criminal policy against economic corruption and its challenges

Abstract
With the formation of the republican scheme in Afghanistan in December 2001 and the establishment of peacekeeping forces and the approval of the constitution in Afghanistan, the international community committed to providing extensive grants for the security and reconstruction of Afghanistan. On the other hand, according to the criminal policy of the United Nations to fight corruption, which was reflected in the United Nations Convention in 2003, several measures were taken in the legal system of Afghanistan for international cooperation in the prevention of corruption, which were not successful in controlling corruption. In this article, in addition to the analysis of Afghanistan's legislative criminal policy against economic corruption, the challenges of preventing and dealing with corruption in Afghanistan despite the adoption of the United Nations Convention against Corruption and numerous national regulations in controlling economic corruption have been examined.

Introduction

In all countries, one of the most important and most necessary duties of the government is to provide public services to citizens. Afghanistan, after the collapse of the Taliban regime and the enormous presence of the international community in the country, has provided a great opportunity to provide such services to its citizens, in order not only to provide the basic needs of the people but could, by using the resources provided and in the framework of procurement contracts, design and implement basic infrastructure projects for the stability, prosperity and economic development of the country. But unfortunately, it did not happen.
  American General Inspection Office for the Reconstruction of Afghanistan, known as "SIGAR", announced in a report published in April 2022 that the aid allocated by the United States from 2002 to the fall of the Afghan government for the reconstruction of this country was more than 145.87 billion dollars. (Sigar, 2022: 2).
This study has analyzed the legal criminal policy in the fight against corruption in the first part of the analytical-descriptive method and based on data review and study of sources including documents, laws and reports of evaluation institutions. In the second part, the challenges of fighting economic corruption and the role of not distributing and using the correct international aid in fueling corruption in government institutions and foreign institutions or companies are mentioned.
 
2.Methodology
This study has analyzed the legal criminal policy in the fight against corruption in the first part of the analytical-descriptive method and based on data review and study of sources including documents, documents, laws and reports of evaluation institutions. In the second part, the challenges of fighting economic corruption and the role of not distributing and using the correct international aid in fueling corruption in government institutions and foreign institutions or companies have been evaluated.
 
3.Results and Discussion
The findings of this study can be summarized in the following headings.
1.3. Legislative criminal policy in the fight against corruption
Examining the legislative criminal policy and the situation of Afghanistan in the two periods of the republican system, formulating economic criminal strategies and policies, establishing laws and regulations, creating institutions and offices and handing over international obligations shows that policymakers in criminalizing and attracting the cooperation of aid countries have been successful. but in implementing the law and prosecuting criminals, issuing orders and eliminating the roots of corruption, they could not get the satisfaction of citizens and donor countries.
2.3. Establishing laws and challenges to fight corruption
 In the last two decades, the Afghan government has enacted several laws in the field of fighting corruption and created legal frameworks in this field. But Afghan leaders have wasted golden opportunities and countless financial and human resources to create, dissolve and integrate anti-corruption institutions. For this reason, legislative policies in the fight against economic and administrative corruption did not have tangible achievements and were doomed to failure.
Inflation and multiplicity of laws on the one hand and merger and dissolution of institutions or their parallel work on the other hand, "challenged and disordered the society and made law enforcers fail.
3.3. Political corruption
 Political corruption is the abuse of power by political and government officials in order to secure personal interests with the aim of increasing power or wealth.
   The division of government institutions after the Bonn Conference in 2001 among the anti-Taliban warlords was more like business than democratic procedures (Schmeidl, 2016: 8). Members of anti-Taliban armed groups reached high government positions after the Bonn Conference (MacGinty, 2010: 580). Therefore, the security and reconstruction of Afghanistan depended to a large extent on armed groups, and in fact, it can be said that corruption and political deals started from here.
This approach continued to the point where important government institutions were bought and exchanged among them.
4.3. Corruption in the contracts of domestic institutions and foreign companies
Financial corruption cases related to the contracts of government institutions reach hundreds of millions of dollars, which are calculated and signed more than the daily rate. The administrative corruption case in the Ministry of Defense related to the procurement of gasoline worth about one billion dollars remained unfinished in this ministry. Procurement contracts in other ministries, such as the Ministry of Interior Affairs of Afghanistan, had a much worse situation than the contracts of the Ministry of National Defense.
Moreover, foreign nationals living in Afghanistan and foreign institutions and some embassies have also played an undeniable role in financial corruption and misappropriation of donated money. It seems that the following documents are enough to prove this claimant.
Sigar's report on the defendants' cases from 2001-2011 It shows the economic corruption among the companies operating in this country.
 
4.Conclusion
According to the research done, it seems that Afghanistan's legislative criminal policy in the fight against corruption in the last two decades, it is considered one of the best and most dynamic periods of legislation in the history of Afghanistan; although from the perspective of legislation and accountability in the field of preventing and fighting corruption, including joining the United Nations To deal with corruption. But this policy was faced with various challenges and obstacles due to the political, social and emergency conditions imposed on the country of Afghanistan, which prevented the proper implementation of criminal policy against corruption.
Incomplete criminalization, displacement of laws and institutions created in the fight against corruption, abuse of legal powers, lack of independence of investigative, and judicial bodies, hasty actions in creating parallel anti-corruption institutions, non-registration of private security companies and lack of supervisory authority. It was due to their activities and political corruption, including formal and substantive shortcomings and challenges in the fight against corruption, that the Afghan government collapsed and accepted defeat.
 

Selection of References

SIGAR. (2020). Special Inspector General for Afghanistan Reconstruction Quarterly Report to the United States Congress. 30 JAN 2020.
SIGAR. (2022). Special Inspector General for Afghanistan Reconstruction Quarterly Report to the United States Congress. APRIL 2022.
Goldstein, J. (2014). EU Confirms Wide Fraud in Afghan Presidential Runoff Election. The New York Times, 16. ‏
Johnson, T. H. (2018). The illusion of Afghanistan’s electoral representative democracy: The cases of Afghan presidential and national legislative elections. Small Wars & Insurgencies, 29(1), pp.1-37. ‏
Bak, M. (2019). Corruption in Afghanistan and the role of development assistance. Transparency International.
Sullivan, T., & Forsberg, C. (2014). Confronting the Threat of Corruption and Organized Crime in Afghanistan. PRISM, 4(4), pp.157-173. ‏
Akseer, T., Haidary, M. S., Miller, R., Sadat, S. M., Satkowski, C., Seese, H., ... & Yousufzai, F. A. (2017). Afghanistan in 2017: A survey of the Afghan people. ‏
Mac Ginty, R. (2010). Warlords and the liberal peace: state-building in Afghanistan. Conflict, Security & Development, 10(4), pp.577-598. ‏
Schmeidl, S. (2016). The contradictions of democracy in Afghanistan: elites, elections and ‘people’s rule’post-2001. Conflict, Security & Development, 16(6), pp.575-594.
Helmandi, M. (2019). Criminal policy of the Afghan government in the fight against administrative corruption, Contemporary Andisheh, 5, (19), pp. 117-144. (In persian)