US proposes halving aid for Pak next year

The Obama administration has requested Congress for only 1.16 billion dollars in aid to Pakistan for the 2014 financial year.

The amount is almost half of the 2.6 billion dollars the U.S. spent in 2012 and a quarter of the 4.5 billion dollars it spent in 2010, a report released on Tuesday revealed.

According to Dawn News, the military aid has also been reduced to 397 million dollars from over 1.2 billion dollars in 2010.

The cuts, however, may not have a major impact on the Pakistani economy as it received an estimated 12.8 billion dollars from July 2012 to May 2013.

Pakistani diplomats in Washington said it would be wrong to reduce the aid as it indicated deterioration in US-Pakistan ties.

According to the report, the diplomats said the Congressional Research Service (CRS), which had reported the aid cuts, also noted that like previous US administrations, the Obama administration continued to support a stable, democratic, and prosperous Pakistan.

For fiscal year 2014, beginning from October 1 this year, the Obama administration has requested a total of 1,162.57 million dollars, of which about two-thirds is for economic assistance and one-third is for security assistance, the report added.