KABUL: The United Nations launched an appeal on Wednesday for $393 million in humanitarian aid to Afghanistan to help millions of vulnerable people this year.

The UN’s humanitarian coordinator in Afghanistan, Mark Bowden, and the country’s chief executive, Abdullah Abdullah, launched the appeal in a live national television broadcast.

The 2016 Humanitarian Response Plan for Afghanistan targets millions of people in need of food and other essentials, including shelter, health care, nutrition, safe water and other necessities, Abdullah said.

He said he was hopeful that donor countries would match their commitments of previous years to assist and support the country’s most vulnerable.

Bowden called on the international community to “redouble” its efforts and deliver “ever increasing levels of assistance” over the coming 12 months.

Meanwhile, Human Rights Watch said in a report Wednesday that Afghanistan has failed to remedy a series of chronic human rights abuses ranging from the torture of prisoners by security forces to brutal mistreatment of women.

The rights watchdog’s 2016 annual report said reform efforts by President Ashraf Ghani’s national unity government had been undermined by failure to contain internal differences and keep local strongmen and power brokers in check.

“Afghanistan’s national unity government squandered important opportunities to tackle serious human rights problems,” Patricia Gossman, senior Afghanistan researcher at Human Rights Watch, said in a statement.

“As reforms have slipped, so have essential human rights protections for detainees, women, and the media.”

HRW said international donors, whose support is essential to the government of one of the world’s poorest economies, had to work more closely with Afghan authorities to ensure that human rights gains made since 2001 were not lost.

The section on Afghanistan, part of a 659-page report reviewing human rights practices in more than 90 countries, painted a bleak picture more than 14 years after US-led forces drove the Taliban from power.