Amid controversy over the government’s handling of corruption cases involving high-level government officials, the Afghan Ministry of Interior (MoI) on Wednesday said that the government will arrest at least eight high-level government officials accused of corruption within the next three months.

Acting Minister of Interior Massoud Andarabi said that Keramuddin Karim, the former head of Afghanistan’s Football Federation (AFF) and Zemarai Paikan, a former commander of the Afghan Public Protection Force, are among the eight individuals who will be arrested.

Andarabi said that the Interior Ministry has also requested Interpol to help in arresting them.

“Some of these individuals have traveled abroad, we have gathered the information about them with the help of Interpol in the country where they live and requested their repatriation,” said Massoud Andarabi, the acting Minister of Interior.

However, Integrity Watch Afghanistan (IWA) has said that the Afghan government has failed to take action against the high-level government officials accused of graft.

The IWA said that the government is trying to show that it is serious about tackling corruption before the upcoming meeting in Geneva with potential funders.

“Anti-corruption measures should not be just symbolic or for attracting foreign aid, anti-corruption campaigns should be carried out in a serious way,” said Sayed Ekram Afzali, the head of IWA.

Last month, Deborah Lyons, the Secretary-General’s Special Representative for Afghanistan, briefed the UN Security Council on the situation in Afghanistan and described corruption as a major challenge for the country.

The UN envoy said that the impunity of well-connected political figures remains a major obstacle to fighting corruption in Afghanistan.

“Like so many countries, Afghanistan continues to be plagued by corruption, which corrodes the confidence of the population and the donor community, and fuels the ongoing conflict. In spite of progress made in previous years in anti-corruption reforms, this progress has slowed in the past year, with key institutional reforms being neglected, including the establishment of the all-too-important independent anti-corruption commission. Apparent impunity of well-connected political figures remains a major issue. Additional progress in the fight against corruption is therefore crucial as the 2020 Pledging Conference on Afghanistan approaches,” she said.

“They do not have any will for fighting corruption, this is only a slogan, they are (govt officials) themselves are involved in corruption, so how can they fight it?” asked Khalil Safai, a political analyst in Kabul.

On Tuesday, Afghan president Ashraf Ghani in speech to participants at the Senior Officials Meeting (SOM) in Kabul said that there is a "national outrage" over corruption.

"There is a national outrage against corruption and a demand for accountability and sufficient capacity in the accountability, rule of law, and security organizations and the active engagement of the media, the Ulema and civil society organizations have created the enabling conditions to have a comprehensive strategy to make measurable and sustained progress against corruption," Ghani said.

Ghani also said:

We are determined to complete all the remaining benchmarks of our current anti-corruption strategy and to enforce the decisions of the Attorney General on those found guilty by the end of October.

“We invite all our bilateral and multilateral partners to join the people and government of Afghanistan in identifying key drivers of corruption and bad governance through a mutual accountability framework based on UNCAC and governing the norms of conduct and accountability of all parties engaged in allocation, distribution, and management of resources for Afghanistan. Dealing explicitly with “special treatment” granted to some individuals and organizations will be essential. Even more essential will be to make anticorruption an integral component of the political agreement with the Taliban,” Ghani said.

Previously, the Afghan Attorney General’s said that over 7,000 people are on a list of those who are accused of corruption.