Afghanistan's Top Bank Faces $900M Losses

He's exhibit A of Afghan corruption: New York Times

(NEWSER) - Sherkhan Farnood hosts an extraordinary poker game at his lavish Kabul home. The participants: Members of Hamid Karzai's inner circle. The stakes: Thousands of dollars, or more than most Afghan families make in a year. It's striking, because Farnood is supposed to be in jail and his assets frozen, after allegedly embezzling millions from Kabul Bank . Officially, he's on day release to try to recoup the money, but officials tell the New York Times he rarely returns to jail, and they doubt he'll ever stand trial. (Check out what he said about his activities before his arrest .) More»

Official resigned and fled to America, blasted Afghanistan government

(NEWSER) - Afghanistan has asked the US to arrest and hand over Abdul Qadeer Fitrat, the natin's Central Bank president who resigned citing fear of reprisals for his investigation of the Kabul Bank corruption scandal . Abdul Qadeer Fitrat resigned yesterday during a trip to the US, the New York Times reports. In a scathing resignation letter, he says Hamid Karzai’s administration constantly tried to block his inquiry, threatened him with legal action, and even “used law enforcement agencies against the staff of the central bank.” More»

Afghanistan's top bank teeters on the brink

(NEWSER) - With Kabul Bank in crisis , authorities in Afghanistan have frozen some assets of all the bank’s principal owners—except for Mahmoud Karzai, brother of Afghan President Hamid Karzai. The Afghan Central Bank has sent a letter banning the bank’s owners from selling property, the Washington Post reports, but it conspicuously omits Karzai, the banks third-largest shareholder. More»

(USER SUBMITTED) - What more could go wrong in woebegone Afghanistan? Well, its largest bank could fail. Fear of that has led long lines of depositors to crowd outposts of Kabul Bank, clamoring for their money, most unable to withdraw more than $1,000. The removal of long-time bank managers and rumors of insolvency and unrecorded loans to Afghan President Hamid Karzai's family seem to have caused the run. More»

Police think they were poisoned the night before

(AP) - Six Afghan private security guards were beheaded during a bank robbery in northern Afghanistan, police said today. An unknown number of robbers raided a Kabul Bank in Balkh province, making off with $269,000 in US and Afghan currency. It appeared the guards had been poisoned beforehand, with someone slipping the poison into their food last night, a police spokesman said. Kabul Bank officials declined to comment. More»