Two US Senators who wield considerable influence over the US foreign aid threatened on Tuesday to withhold funding for Afghanistan if the government in Kabul did not cease attempting to collect customs fines for the US military cargo being shipped out of the country as part of the troop drawdown.
Senator Patrick J Leahy, chairman of a subcommittee that oversees foreign aid programmes, called the Afghan government’s request that the US military should pay $70 million in customs fines ludicrous “after all we’ve given them.”
“I’ve seen some stupid things from that government,” he said during a hearing convened to unveil next year’s budget for the State Department and foreign operations. “I’ve seen some things that make you wonder what universe they live in, but this went beyond the pale.”
His tone, which was echoed by the subcommittee’s ranking Republican, Senator Lindsey O Graham, gave voice in unusually public and stark terms to the exasperation many US officials have come to feel over the conduct of Afghan President Hamid Karzai’s government.
The senators proposed in an amendment included in the draft bill to withhold $5 in aid for every $1 imposed in fines for shipping out the US military equipment. The bill may be amended before it comes up for a vote by the full Senate.
“It’s a subtle message which I think they will understand,” Leahy said, referring to the potential cut in Afghan funds. Graham, calling Kabul’s position “ridiculous,” said the amendment should “send a message to the Karzai government.”
In an unprecedented move, Karzai’s cabinet recently shut down Afghanistan’s land borders to US shippers for about a week. Afghan officials said they took the drastic measure to compel the United States to pay fines for failing to present properly processed customs forms for thousands of containers that were exiting the country, mostly through the Pakistani border.
The customs fight has forced the US commanders in Afghanistan to rely more heavily on cargo planes to ship out supplies, an alternative that costs much more than ground shipping.
