New Delhi [India], October 14 (ANI): India has said that its policy towards Afghanistan is guided by its friendship with the Afghan people and it is essential that humanitarian assistance providers are accorded unimpeded, unrestricted and direct access to the country.

Ministry of External Affairs (MEA) spokesperson Arindam Bagchi said at the weekly briefing on Thursday that India has in the past contributed towards developing infrastructure in Afghanistan and provided humanitarian assistance.

"India's policy towards Afghanistan is guided by our friendship with Afghan people," he said.

Answering a query concerning humanitarian assistance to Afghanistan, Bagchi also referred to External Affairs Minister S Jaishankar's remarks at the United Nations High-Level Meeting on the Humanitarian Situation in Afghanistan held last month. He said India's approach to the issue of humanitarian assistance was laid very clearly in External Affairs Minister's intervention "which includes India's willingness to stand by Afghan people".

"The need of the international community to create the best possible enabling environment. It is essential that humanitarian assistance providers are accorded unimpeded, unrestricted and direct access to Afghanistan," Bagchi said.

Afghanistan is witnessing a humanitarian crisis that has deepened with the collapse of the Afghan government and take over of Kabul by the Taliban in August this year.

Jaishankar had said that UN Security Council resolution 2593 should guide the international community's approach in the coming days on Afghanistan.

He also said that Afghanistan is passing through a critical and challenging phase and there has been a sea change in its political, economic, social and security situation, and consequently, in its humanitarian needs.

United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees Filippo Grandi had said last month that the humanitarian situation in Afghanistan is pretty desperate and called for urgent aid to the country.

The UN agency had said that over 18 million Afghans required urgent humanitarian assistance even prior to the events that unfolded over the past few weeks in the country.

More than 3.5 million have been displaced from their homes by conflict and remain inside the country, including some 6,30,000 uprooted during 2021. (ANI)