Pak to get $300 mn from US for war on terror

The Bush administration has earmarked $300 million for Pakistan from nearly $300 billion that the White House is seeking from the Congress for the global war on terror.

The White House is seeking $294.8 billion to fund global counterterrorism operations, including $99.6 billion for fiscal year 2007, $145.2 billion in 2008 and $50 billion in 2009.

The majority of the funding has been allocated to the Pentagon but more than $9 billions has been sought from the State Department budget.

The White House has asked for more than $36 billion for the State Department, a 22 per cent increase from its 2006 appropriation and much of this is slated for transformational diplomacy initiative that the Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice has been talking about in her testimonies before the House Foreign Affairs Committee and the Senate Foreign Relations Committee over the last two days.

It is being pointed out that the State Department's foreign military financing initiative provides security assistance to help allies defend their countries from internal and external threats.

If the $4.5 billion for the programme is approved it will have $2.4 billion to Israel, $1.3 billion to Egypt, $300 million to Pakistan, $200 million to Jordan and $15.7 million to Indonesia.

An additional $89.5 million is sought to help provide training for foreign military officers under States International Military Education and Training programme.