A crisis in relations looked set to deepen after a U.S. House-Senate negotiating panel agreed to freeze $700 million in U.S. aid to Pakistan until it gives assurances it is helping fight the spread of improvised explosive devices in the region.
The United States wants “assurances that Pakistan is countering improvised explosive devices in their country that are targeting our coalition forces,” Representative Howard McKeon, a House Republican, told reporters.
The United States has allocated some $20 billion in security and economic aid to Pakistan since 2001, much of it in the form of reimbursements for assistance in fighting militants.
But U.S. lawmakers have expressed increasing frustration with Pakistan’s efforts in the war.
The decision to freeze aid could prompt Pakistan to harden its stance towards Washington.
“I think the Pakistan side will understand the type of signal that is coming, which shows it’s not only a question of aid,” said former general and security analyst Talat Masood.
“The whole attitude of the U.S. and the relationship will be affected by these measures because they know Pakistan will not be in a position to control the smuggling.”
U.S. lawmakers said that many Afghan bombs are made with fertilizer smuggled by militants across the border from Pakistan into Afghanistan.
“The vast majority of the material used to make improvised explosive devices used against U.S. forces in Afghanistan originates from two fertilizer factories inside Pakistan,” Senator John McCain, a Republican, said in the Senate last week.
A Congressional Research Service report in October said the Pakistani factories, owned by one of the country’s biggest companies, Pakarab, have been producing over 300,000 metric tonnes of ammonium nitrate per year since 2004.
RAMPANT SMUGGLING
The United States has urged Pakistan to strictly regulate the distribution of ammonium nitrate to Afghanistan. So far, Pakistan has only produced draft legislation on the issue.
Analysts say U.S. demands will be tough to meet because of rampant corruption on both sides of the border which makes smuggling easy.
One businessman explained how easy it is to get through security posts along the porous border.
“We pay a 1,200 rupees bribe to the Pakistani Frontiers Corps on the border for every car carrying fertilizer,” said Kamal Khan in the town of Chaman near the border with Afghanistan.
“Fertilizer is smuggled on trucks, pickup trucks, motorcycles, bicycles and donkey carts.”
“If you say, ‘ok you can only produce these ureas and you cannot produce the nitrates’ it means you are going to impose unrealistic terms on Pakistan,” said Amir Rana director of the Pakistan Institute for Peace Studies.
The provision freezing $700 million in aid was agreed upon by leaders of the armed services committees from both parties in the House and Senate, including McCain. It is part of compromise legislation authorizing U.S. defense programs expected to be approved this week, McKeon said.
He said the bill would also require the Pentagon to deliver a strategy for improving the effectiveness of U.S. aid to Pakistan.
US lawmakers freeze $700m to Pakistan
