ISLAMABAD, Aug. 3, Reuter: Pakistani Foreign Minister Sahabzada Yaqub Khan accused the U.S. Congress today of violating the trust between the two countries by voting to suspend a new aid program.
In a Parliamentary statement, he said Pakistan was dismayed at last week’s vote by a Congressional subcommittee to suspend aid over allegations that Islamabad was trying to make nuclear weapons.
Yaqub Khan was speaking the day after talks on the current crisis between’ the two allies with visiting U.S. undersecretary of state for political affairs Michael Armacost.
The House appropriations subcommittee on foreign operating voted on Wednesday for suspension of a new six year aid program to Pakistan for 105 days.
This followed suspicions that Pakistan was involved in alleged attempts by a Pakistani born Canadian to illegally export a steel alloy that could be used for nuclear weapons.
In his statement to the Pakistani Senate, reported by the official APP news agency, Yaqub Khan reiterated his government’s denial that it was involved in the case.
“Neither the government of Pakistan nor any of its agencies has sponsored any violation of the export laws of the United States,” he said.
The Foreign Minister said the evidence suggested that the case was a plot to scuttle the new aid package, 4.02 billion dollars in military loans and economic grants. The Canadian businessman, Arshad Pervez, is to be tried before a Philadelphia court. Yaqub Khan said the committee had acted with undue haste in trying to implicate and chastise Pakistan before the case had come to court.
“The denial of a fair chance to Pakistan to explain its viewpoint can only shake public confidence in the impartiality and probity of the subcommittee’s delegations, besides violating the mutual trust that has marked the relationship between Pakistan and the United States”, he said.
He said the steel in question had diverse industrial uses and could be freely obtained in some developed countries. The U.S. government has asked Pakistan for an explanation over the affair while the Congressional committee wants Islamabad to cooperate in the Pervez case before resuming aid.
Under U.S. law the Reagan administration would be obliged to halt aid to Pakistan if it were proved to be building a nuclear bomb. Islamabad has frequently denied it.
USS. officials fear an aid cutoff would prompt Pakistan to halt the flow of western arms to the guernlJas fighting Soviet forces in neighboring Afghanistan.
Armacost, a regular visitor to Pakistan, also discussed the nine year old Afghan conflict with Yaqub Khan yesterday and met Prime Minister Mohammad Khan Junejo.
He held talks today with General Akhtar Abudl Rehman Khan, Chairman of the joint chiefs of staff committee, and with members of the powerful military interservices intelligence, a U.S. spokesman said.
Armcost has dining later with President Mohammad ZiaulHaq before addressing ’a late night news conference.
Article extracted from this publication >> August 7, 1987
