ST. PETERSBURG, June 15. /TASS/. The Islamic State (IS) terror group, outlawed in Russia, seeks to undermine security and stability in Afghanistan and its neighboring countries, relying on external support, Russian Foreign Ministry Spokeswoman Maria Zakharova said on Thursday.
"The security situation in Afghanistan is tense," she pointed out at a briefing on the sidelines of the St. Petersburg International Economic Forum. "Clearly, ISIL (the former name of the IS - TASS) is engaged in subversive activities against the countries’ current authorities. At the same time, it seeks to undermine stability in the Central Asian countries neighboring Afghanistan. In this, ISIL is clearly encouraged by external forces; ISIL members themselves have confirmed that the terrorist group receives funds from foreign intelligence agencies and there are foreign terrorists among its fighters," she added.
The Russian Foreign Ministry spokeswoman pointed out that "Kabul has been able to keep the situation stable in the country, although that is not an easy thing to do given sanctions and Western countries’ move to block the Afghan Central Bank’s assets." "We have seen the first positive results of the new Afghan authorities’ anti-drug efforts," Zakharova went on to say. "The remaining economic and humanitarian difficulties are the obvious result of the policy of double standards pursued by Washington and its satellites who continue to link humanitarian assistance to the country’s population with political concessions from the Afghan leadership," she noted.
"Russia, for its part, continues to provide free assistance to the Afghan people," Zakharova emphasized. "In particular, another shipment of Russian food was delivered to Afghanistan in May as part of our core contribution to the UN World Food Program, which contained about one thousand tons of food," she specified.