A State Department report said that the United States intended for assistance to Pakistan to continue and wants to focus on “signature” projects in Pakistan.
Congress had slipped on its 2009 promise to triple nonmilitary aid to Pakistan over five years. The appropriations reached the promised level of $1.5 billion in 2010, but last year amounted to only $1 billion, the document said.
The report stated that US officials are currently looking to select a major new infrastructure project “that would both contribute to power generation and water management” in Pakistan, it said.
Support on Capitol Hill for aid to Pakistan plummeted amid accusations that some in the Pakistani government have aided anti-US militants.
US civilian aid to Afghanistan has also peaked, the State Department said in the report, declaring the United States would spend less on development assistance there as it withdraws troops from the country.
“We have reached the high water mark of our civilian funding levels” for Afghanistan, the department said in a status report on civilian efforts in Afghanistan and Pakistan that was sent to congressional offices and obtained by Reuters on Thursday.
US economic and humanitarian aid to Afghanistan has fallen from $4.1 billion in 2010 to $2.5 billion this year, the report by the Office of the Special Representative for Afghanistan and Pakistan said.
