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International relief workers were held up and had their vehicle and belongings stolen by armed men on the main road to Kabul in eastern Afghanistan on Friday. John Siston of the International Rescue Committee (IRC) told IRIN that four colleagues - two Americans and two Afghans - were forced out of their vehicle at gunpoint by three men.
The car and its contents, including cash, were stolen, he said. The IRC team made its way back to the Pakistan border, and then on to Peshawar, in northwestern Pakistan, with the help of the Pakistani authorities. Siston said Taliban officials had recovered the vehicle on Monday, but the cash and other valuables were missing.
The IRC remained committed to working in Afghanistan, he added. In Siston's view, however, the security incident and reports of other unlawful activities "negatively affected the willingness of aid agencies to work in Afghanistan, and ultimately limited aid to recipients".
This article was produced by IRIN News while it was part of the United Nations Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs. Please send queries on copyright or liability to the UN. For more information: https://shop.un.org/rights-permissions