Report: U.S. to Pour 750 Million (Aid) Into Pakistan's Tribal Areas

[Hissyspit]

Source: Agence France-Presse

US to pour 750 million into Pakistan's tribal areas: report

WASHINGTON (AFP) - The administration of President George W. Bush plans to pour 750 million dollars worth of aid into PakistanÂ’s tribal areas in a bid to wrest it away from Al-Qaeda and Taliban militants, The New York Times reported on its website late Sunday.

But citing unnamed officials involved in the planning, the newspaper said some people were warning of the dangers of distributing so much money in an area where oversight is impossible.

Who will be given the aid has quickly become one of the most contentious questions between local officials and American planners concerned that millions might fall into the wrong hands, the report said.

A draft of the US Agency for International Development plan given to The Times by an official who worked on it warns that the "severe governance deficiencies" in the tribal areas will make it virtually impossible for the aid to be sustainable or to overcome the "areaÂ’s chronic underdevelopment and consequent volatility," the paper pointed out.

The plan was highlighted during a visit to Pakistan in June by Richard Boucher, the assistant secretary of state for South and Central Asian affairs, as a measure of WashingtonÂ’s support for Pakistani President Pervez Musharraf, The Times said.


Read more: http://news.yahoo.com/s/afp/20070716/pl_afp/uspakistanaid_070716040653

[MADem]

1. Those tribesmen will smile, take the money, and laugh behind their hands at us.

"Oversight is impossible."

Yeah, no shit!!!

[Botany]

2. Some Goat Farmer's House to be

Thanx for the $.

[sam sarrha]

3. that is why the chimp is cutting finds to poor and crippled children's aid and other social programs

[sam sarrha]

4. bribe money for Muscharif.. he is in a bit of a spot himself now

[saigon68]

8. Poor Seniors in US go without medicine

Thats the Chimp's way.

His Take-------"Those senior are lazy and never saved for old age"

[Hubert Flottz]

5. Bush gave the Taliban in Afghanistan several million shortly...

before the attack on 9/11.

Maybe that's why the Bushie's terra forecasting gut is getting those "Feelings"

All crooked roads lead to the GOP...

[trof]

6. And we're paying Paki Army border troops $100 mil a month.

To lazy to go back and link.
It's on BuzzFlash.

[formercia]

7. The ISI will take their 50% cut.

We all know where that will go.

Next Year, the Taliban will have newer and more powerful weapons and brand new SUVs.

80% of the rest will go to Blackwater to protect the Halliburton contractors who will build 2 soon to be dilapidated schools.

[Drum]

9. But, but...I don't WANT to pour my $ on that fire!

:cry:

They're bankrupting us! Paying them over there, and they can't pay us here.

[ProgressiveEconomist]

10. If Musharraf falls to a Muslim fundie, there could be more reason to fear nuke attacks

through proliferation to unaccountable small groups.

I sure hope some ot the millions are going to promote more exposure of young people to ideas from more modern Arab societies. But I suspect Dubya's neocons will just hand out crank-powered radios that only get Voice of America.

[Coventina]

11. This is exactly what the Roman Empire did with the Picts

Tried to buy them off so that the Picts would quit harrassing the empire.

The Picts took the money gleefully, waited awhile, then resumed business as usual, hoping for another payout.

[conspirator]

12. Yeap. they will gladly accept the food and bite the US hand n/t

[JDPriestly]

13. Who shall be given the aid? Easy-- Benazhir Bhutto

(I think that is how you spell her name.) She is a woman and I believe she champions democratic institutions. Our aid should be dependent on allowing her to control the money.

[closeupready]

14. Her hands aren't so clean, from what I understand.

How much do you know of her?

[maxsolomon]

16. no one's hands are "clean" in pakistan

the perfect is the enemy of the good.

this money needs to BUILD something substantial that the pashtun value. clean water? sewage treatment?

[closeupready]

17. True, good point.

If it makes a positive difference, then spend away.

[Tempest]

18. She's as corrupt as the rest of them - the money would end up in foreign banks

www.samsloan.com/benazir.htm

A decade after she led this impoverished nation from military rule to democracy, Benazir Bhutto is at the heart of a widening corruption inquiry that Pakistani investigators say has traced more than $100 million to foreign bank accounts and properties controlled by Bhutto's family.

[JDPriestly]

19. You mean she did what Bush and Cheney are doing?

Still, she was elected to do it, I do believe. (As were they.)

[Joanne98]

15. grrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrr

[Megahurtz]

20. Yet They Will Not

give aid to their own Country. :grr:

[IndianaGreen]

21. Money wasted down the drain!

As another DUer pointed out to me on an earlier thread on increased violence in the tribal areas, the people that live there are xenophobic and are ethnically closer to the Pashtuns of Afghanistan than they are to Pakistanis.

[tom_paine]

22. Sounds like a "payoff". I wonder how much of that brown envelope of cash is for Bin Laden

I say again: The chatter coming from the Bush Administration worries me that the Bushies are going to have their friends hit us again.