US Aid To Pakistan: “Where Did 70% Of It Vanish?”

I am just adding another point to Shaun Mullen’s post on the Bush administration’s acts of, what he calls, “criminality and misdeeds”. What took my breath away was this story in The Guardian newspaper that American officials processing the payments at the US embassy in Islamabad have concluded that no one knows where 70 per cent of the American aid to Pakistan has vanished!!! Wow!

“America’s massive military aid package to Pakistan has come under scrutiny after allegations that as much as 70% of $5.4bn in assistance has been misspent. Pakistan provides over 100,000 troops and directs the fight; the US foots the bill for food, fuel, ammunition and maintenance. The cash payments — averaging $80m a month — have been a cornerstone of US support for President Pervez Musharraf.”

So is Bush and Co scared that once their man in Islamabad leaves office a lot of inconvenient questions may surface? Is it that the major threat to the US administration in the “War on Terror” does not come from terrorists but the change of guard in Islamabad? But that’s not the point. What is alarming is that no one in the US seems interested in the blatant misuse of the public money.

Let’s continue with The Guardian story: “Since 2002, the US has paid the operating costs of Pakistan’s military operations in the tribal belt along the Afghan border, where Taliban and al-Qaida fighters are sheltering.

“But over the past 18 months, as militants seized vast swaths of the tribal belt and repelled a string of Pakistani offensives, the funding has come under the microscope.

“The controversy highlights not only strains in the relationship between Washington and Islamabad but also the limits of President George Bush’s ‘war on terror’.”

More here…

And here…