Afghanistan's Criminal Policy on Economic Crimes

Abstract

The difference between economic crimes and financial crimes lies in their goals and impacts. The primary objective of financial crimes is to protect private property rights and combat ordinary and public criminals, while the goal of criminalizing and punishing economic crimes is to adopt a punitive policy and support the country's economic system in matters of production, distribution, monetary, currency, customs, banking, and combating white-collar criminals and individuals who abuse their governmental and political and economic influence for personal gain through deception, fraud, or coercive methods to seize public assets and wealth. The Law on Monitoring the Compliance with the Anti-Corruption Strategy in Afghanistan, alongside the substantive and procedural law, namely the Penal Code and the Principles of Criminal Procedure, indicates that the measures taken by the Afghan government to regulate the economic situation of society and combat economic crimes such as embezzlement, bribery, money laundering, and prevention of government officials' abuses are differentiated punitive policies. However, white-collar criminals are often not identified due to their influence within the government structure, and even if they are recognized, they are not pursued for conviction and punishment due to the weakness of the executive and judicial system and the lack of a strong punitive policy. The reason for this inefficiency is that a differentiated punitive policy alone cannot resist white-collar criminals and prevent their extremely dangerous and harmful crimes. Instead, the differentiated punitive policy should be coordinated and differentiated in both the legislative and enforcement stages.