ISLAMABAD, May 3: Prime Minister’s senior aide Sartaj Aziz on Tuesday cautioned US that Pakistan will purchase F-16s from other countries if it does not arrange funding.
“Pakistan will buy F-16s from some other country if funding [from US] is not arranged,” Aziz informed. His statement comes hours after US State Department spokesperson John Kirby said Pakistan should pay if it wants F-16 deal to go through.
Aziz stressed the importance of F-16 jets in the fight against terrorism and said they were pivotal to the national defence of Pakistan.
The US State Department on Monday said it has asked Pakistan to fund the whole purchase of F-16 jet fighters on its own. “Given congressional objections, we have told the Pakistanis that they should put forward national funds for that purpose,” US State Department spokesperson John Kirby said during his weekly press briefing.
“As a matter of longstanding principle, the Department of State opposes conditions to the release of appropriated foreign assistance funds. We believe that such conditions limit the president and the secretary’s ability to conduct foreignpolicy in the best interest of the United States,” he added.
Previously, Islamabad was supposed to pay only $270 million while the Barack Obama-led administration was to pay $430 million in subsidy through the US foreign military financing budget for the fighter jets.
However, during a congressional hearing on Wednesday, US lawmakers made it clear that they would not allow the Obama administration to use US funds for the deal.
The decision to stop the subsidy came after the hearing of a sub-committee on Asia and Pacific of the US Congress Committee on Foreign Affairs last week where lawmakers accused Pakistan of not doing enough to fight militants and expressed concerns that the jets could be used against India while also raising objections to using American taxpayers’ money to fund the sale.-Agencies
