WAshington:The Trump administration notified congress on wednesday that it was putting $255million in military assistance to Pakistan into the equivalent of an escrow account that Islamabad can only access if it does more to crack down on internal terror networks launching attacks on neighbouring Afghanistan.
The dueling messages sent to Pakistan-promoting aid but attaching strings if the country's counter terror efforts fall short-are part of an increasingly confrontational in an alliance that has been strained.
The United States has provided Pakistan more than $33billion in aid since 2002.But the annual funding has declined in recent years as Washington became increasingly disenchanted with Pakista's quiet support for the Haqqani network and the Taliban,whose attacks have been responsible for the deaths of American troops in Afghanistan.
Still,American officials have long recognized that Pakistan has tried to crack down on terror groups,and PALYS AN IMPORTANT ROLE FACILITATING supply shipments to the United States military in Afghanistan.
Last week,in announcing his new strategy for the war in Afghanistan,president Trump excoriated Pakistan.
State Department officials said that Mr Trum's promised changes would bring explicit conditions on military aid.once Pakistan more aggressively pursues the Taliban and Haqqani network,the aid will be released -a determination to be made by secretary of state Rex.W. Tillerson,officials said.
Last week,Mr Tillerson suggested that the United States's patience with Pakistan was nearing a breaking point.
Critics of American aid to Pakistan said the administration was still not being tough enough.
The $255million in military assistance was the largest portion of $1.1billion in aid authorized by congress in 2016 that also included money for counter narcotics operations and health initiatives.if the state department had failed to notify congress in the next few weeks of its intention to spend the money,it would have been returned to the United States Treasury.
Rather than lose such a carrot,Trump administration officials said they wanted to use the money as incentive for Pakistan to change its behavior.By effectively putting the funds into escrow,the Trump adminstration also allows its own ongoing review of its policy toward Pakistan to continue unaffected by aid concerns,official said wednesday.
The Obama administration tried to use the sale of eight new f-16 fighter jets to Pakistan in the same way to persuade Pakistan's government to better police its border with Afghanistan.congressional strings on the deal made it less attractive to Pakistan.
Mr.Trump's explicit call for India to become more engaged in Afghanistan demonstrated that Washington's long history balancing the two south Asian rivals has tipped in India's favor,which has deeply alarmed Islamabad.
But the Trump administration can afford to ignore Pakistan and its nuclear arsenal,which has served as a source for nuclear materials sent to Iran,North Korea and Libya.