WASHINGTON – US Secretary of State John Kerry praised cooperation by the Pakistan government and the army in fighting terrorism during a Senate hearing to review the Fiscal Year 2017 Budget Request that includes $742 million in aid to Pakistan.
“We are requesting $742 million in aid to Pakistan to support its citizens as they seek security, build democracy and sustain economic growth and development even as Pakistan continues to suffer from terrorist attacks,” the secretary said in the opening statement before the Senate Foreign Relations Committee.
The US State Department is seeking around $50 billion in the new federal budget to sustain America’s international engagement. The Overseas Contingency Operations portion of the US State Department’s budget amounts to $14.9 billion which, Kerry said, will improve their ability to prevent, respond, and recover from crises abroad and also help allies and partners such as Pakistan and Afghanistan counter threats.
While responding to an observation by the chairman of the committee, Kerry said that the “Pakistan’s government and the military has been very cooperative, very engaged in the fight against terrorism”.
“They have lost tens of thousands of people themselves and there had been 160,000 to 180,000 troops in the Western part of the country conducing a sweep, major operations in North Waziristan and elsewhere,” the secretary said. He added that they drove the Haqqani Network into new locations.
Kerry said that he met Prime Minister Nawaz Sharif a few weeks ago and they discussed need to rein in particular terrorist groups that were either homegrown in Pakistan or using Pakistan as a sanctuary. On the sale of F-16s, the secretary again said that the Pakistani military has been deeply engaged in the fight against terrorism.
The US Defence Security Cooperation Agency (DSCA), which broker government-to-government arms sales, last week notified to the Congress about the decision of the US State Department to sell additional F-16 aircraft to Pakistan.
The decision to sell the fighter aircraft came in the face of stiff resistance by the Indian lobby in Washington, and the Indian External Affairs Ministry also expressed ‘disappointment’ at the decision.
But, Pentagon Press Secretary Peter Cook told a briefing last week the F-16 sale to Pakistan should not be of any concern to India and that the deal took into account the regional security situation.
Pakistan is one of the older users of F-16s and has received these jet fighters from the United States periodically over the past 30 years. The F-16 aircraft have been used in counter-terrorism operations which started in 2004.
