I 
114TH CONGRESS 
2D SESSION 
H. R. 6308 
To support enhanced accountability for United States assistance to 
Afghanistan, and for other purposes. 
IN THE HOUSE OF REPRESENTATIVES 
NOVEMBER 14, 2016 
Mr. GRAYSON introduced the following bill; which was referred to the 
Committee on Foreign Affairs 
A BILL 
To support enhanced accountability for United States 
assistance to Afghanistan, and for other purposes. 
Be it enacted by the Senate and House of Representa-
tives of the United States of America in Congress assembled, 
SECTION 1. SHORT TITLE. 
This Act may be cited as the ‘‘Afghanistan Account-
ability Act of 2016’’. 
SEC. 2. DEFINED TERM. 
In this Act, the term ‘‘appropriate congressional com-
mittees’’ means— 
(1) the Committee on Foreign Relations of the 
Senate; 
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surgency and by extension the United States and the 
wider world. 
(2) Since 2001, the United States has worked 
with a broad coalition of nations that has helped to 
dramatically improve numerous development indica-
tors within Afghanistan, including— 
(A) a dramatic increase in the number of 
girls enrolled in primary education from an esti-
mated 5,000 under the Taliban to 2,400,000 
girls as of 2010; 
(B) an increase in the percentage of indi-
viduals above the poverty line from 25.4 percent 
in 2002 to 35.8 percent in 2011; 
(C) an increase in the percentage of indi-
viduals who now have access to an improved 
water source in rural areas from 22 percent in 
2001 to 56 percent in 2012; 
(D) a precipitous decline in maternal mor-
tality from 1,200/100,000 births in 1995 to 
400/100,000 births in 2013; and 
(E) an expansion of women’s rights. 
(3) Numerous research studies have shown that 
government corruption is a driver of conflict and 
particularly so in Afghanistan, where it has served 
as a powerful recruitment tool for the Taliban. 
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(4) Since the first democratic transfer of power 
in the history of Afghanistan in 2014, President 
Ashraf Ghani and Chief Executive Officer Abdullah 
Abdullah have led a National Unity Government 
that has identified key security and development 
challenges in order to make Afghanistan a full and 
productive member of the community of democratic 
nations. 
(5) The National Unity Government has re-
newed specific focus on addressing corruption within 
the country as a driver of instability, including re-
opening a fraud case involving high level officials 
and the Kabul Bank that resulted in the disappear-
ance of an estimated $1,000,000,000. 
(6) In its report ‘‘Realizing Self Reliance: Com-
mitments to Reform and Renewed Partnership’’, the 
Government of Afghanistan committed to the inter-
national community in London in December 2014, 
to address the ‘‘main drivers of corruption in Af-
ghanistan,’’ including ‘‘collusive procurement prac-
tices, weak rule of law and abuse of the legal sys-
tem, and arbitrary regulations that build in incen-
tives to pay bribes’’. Government of Afghanistan 
commitments included— 
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(A) forming an independent anti-corrup-
tion commission with time-bound prosecutorial 
powers; 
(B) implementing recommendations by the 
Monitoring and Evaluation Committee on a na-
tional action plan to reduce corruption; 
(C) requiring all government officials to 
provide public declarations of their assets; 
(D) meeting all Financial Action Task 
Force (FATF) requirements to further limit 
and investigate illicit fund flows; 
(E) forming a national procurement board 
staffed by qualified professionals who will man-
age all large value contracts using internation-
ally recognized standards and procedures; and 
(F) delineating the roles, responsibilities, 
and jurisdiction of anti-corruption institutions 
such as the High Office of Oversight and Anti- 
Corruption (HOO) and the Attorney General to 
restrict them to focus on their core function of 
enforcement instead of oversight. 
(7) The December 2014 Government of Af-
ghanistan report ‘‘Realizing Self Reliance: Commit-
ments to Reform and Renewed Partnership’’, ex-
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pressed a commitment to ‘‘enhancing productivity, 
growth and revenues’’ by— 
(A) developing natural resources through 
public-private partnerships that bring in rents, 
taxes, and profits; 
(B) removing obstacles to trade and transit 
and ending smuggling that diverts revenue 
away from the treasury; 
(C) negotiating expanded market access in 
regional and global markets; 
(D) gradually formalizing the informal 
economy and changing the compact between the 
state and citizens to one where citizens pay 
taxes for services they tangibly benefit from; 
and 
(E) transferring government payments 
electronically to eliminate losses in transit. 
(8) In 2012, international donors and the Gov-
ernment of Afghanistan agreed to the Tokyo Mutual 
Accountability Framework (‘‘TMAF’’) which com-
mitted to provide $4,000,000,000 in economic assist-
ance per year from 2012–2015 and sustain assist-
ance at or near the same levels of the past decade 
through 2017, while the Government of Afghanistan 
committed to meet benchmarks related to democracy 
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and governance, public finance and revenue genera-
tion, and economic development. 
(9) At the end of 2014, under the TMAF, the 
Government of Afghanistan had fallen short in meet-
ing benchmarks related to: revenue collection, the 
enhancement of women’s rights, corruption and the 
illicit economy, and the protection of human rights. 
(10) In the Joint Declaration following the 
London Conference on Afghanistan of December 4, 
2014, the international community and the new Gov-
ernment of Afghanistan agreed to refresh the exist-
ing TMAF and associated commitments at the 2015 
Senior Officials Meeting based on the reform pro-
gram and priorities as laid out by the Government 
of Afghanistan. 
(11) Afghanistan faces great difficulties in 
making progress in countering illegal narcotics and 
remains the leading global illicit opium poppy pro-
ducer. 
(12) The illegal narcotics trade results in the 
transfer of illicit funds and encourages and also re-
quires corrupt financial transactions, and, if mini-
mized, could have beneficial impacts on trade and 
reduce overall levels of corruption. 
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