“We have to suspend aid to Egyptian military because the military has overturned the vote of the people,” McCain, who is also a member of the Senate’s Foreign Relations Committee, said on Friday.
“We cannot repeat the same mistakes that we made in other times of our history by supporting removal of freely elected governments.”
McCain said that Washington should demand Egyptian army to set a timetable for elections and for making of a new constitution.
“And then we should evaluate whether to continue with aid or not,” McCain said.
US has been granting financial aid to Egypt since 1979, which is considered a critical US national security priority.
The country receives the second-highest amount of American financial assistance after Israel. The US provides $1.5bn a year to Egypt in military and economic assistance and around $1.3bn of this amount goes the the Egyptian army.
http://www.aljazeera.com
6/7/13
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US Senate rejects proposal to halt Egypt aid...Rand Paul proposed that Washington label Morsi’s ouster a coup, spend funds ‘at home’...
ReplyDeleteWASHINGTON (AP) — The US Senate rejected a proposal Wednesday to take money meant for aid to Egypt and instead spend it on building bridges at home, after a potential Republican presidential candidate challenged the Obama administration’s refusal to label the ouster of Egypt’s president a military.
Sen. Rand Paul’s amendment to next year’s transportation bill would have halted the $1.5 billion in assistance the US gives Egypt each year. Most of it is military assistance.
Paul cited the US law that bans most forms of support for countries that suffer a military “coup.” The administration has said it won’t make that determination about the Egyptian army’s July 3 ouster of the Islamist President Mohammed Morsi.
“Our nation’s bridges are crumbling,” said Paul, a strict conservative who has previously failed in attempts to cut US support programs for Egypt, Libya and Pakistan. “I propose that we take the billion dollars that is now being illegally given to Egypt and spend it at home.”
The Senate voted 86-13 against the measure. It was the first to be proposed in either chamber of Congress since the army arrested Morsi, suspended the constitution and cracked down on his Muslim Brotherhood. A series of deadly protests have taken place since then in what was once Washington’s strongest ally in the Muslim world......http://www.timesofisrael.com/us-senate-rejects-proposal-to-halt-egypt-aid/
1/8/13