PAK LOSES US AID WORTH $1.6 BILLION
WASHINGTON: The US has said $1.66 billion in security aid for Pakistan has been suspended since January in the wake of a public rebuke by President Donald Trump for not doing enough against terrorism.
The department of defence put a dollar figure on the administration’s growing dissatisfaction with Pakistan on Tuesday, informing reporters that “$1.66 billion of security assistance to Pakistan is suspended”.
No details were offered, triggering speculation in some quarters that this was an add-on suspension of new funds in view of Trump’s latest criticism of Pakistan. “This is not a new decision or a new announcement on the Coalition Support Funds (CSF) security assistance freeze,” Pentagon spokesperson Lt Col Kone Faulkner said in an email response. “The suspension of security assistance to Pakistan was announced in January 2018. CSF is included in the suspension, which remains in place.
The $1.66 billion figure provided yesterday is a total of security assistance dollars to Pakistan that has been suspended to date,” Faulkner said.
The Trump administration had announced in January it was suspending nearly $2 bn in security assistance to Pakistan for its failure to take decisive action against terrorists operating from its soil. A portion of that suspended money — $300 million — was repurposed at the end of the fiscal year on September 30.
That was also seen erroneously as a new suspension, a US official said on background. “It was repurposed to be spent under a different budgetary head to prevent it from lapsing.”
That money was from the defence department’s 2018 budget — the National Defense Appropriation Act, 2018 — and it would have lapsed as unspent allocation. Approximately the same amount, $300 million, is “sitting there, standing by for Pakistan for this year (from the 2019 budget) should the suspension be lifted”, the official said, adding that such determination will be made by the president.
The secretary of state has to make the determination technically, and certify it, based on Pakistani counter-terrorism actions, for the money to be released.
In a recent interview to Fox News, Trump said Pakistan didn’t do “a damn thing” for the United States despite the billions it has received in assistance.