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Trump’s aid freeze affects Lanka
View(s):Sri Lanka will be among the countries that will be affected by the new Donald Trump administration’s decision to freeze all existing foreign assistance and halt new aid.
The newly appointed United States Secretary of State, Marco Rubio, sent a cable to all US diplomatic missions, outlining the move, which threatens billions of dollars of funding from the State Department and the US Agency for International Development (USAID) for programmes worldwide, foreign media reports said.
President Donald Trump signed an executive order temporarily suspending all U.S. foreign assistance programmes for 90 days, following which the State Department ordered a wide-scale review of all foreign assistance to be completed within 85 days to ensure the aid adheres to President Trump’s foreign policy goals.
The United States has provided more than $2 billion (nearly Rs. 720 billion) in assistance to Sri Lanka since 1956, according to the US Embassy in Colombo.
The US-funded programmes are aimed at promoting market-driven growth, fostering environmental sustainability and resilience, and promoting good governance practices. The funds are disbursed across government, non-governmental organisations, and civil society.
Agency reports said yesterday that the Secretary of State’s memo explicitly made exceptions for military assistance to Israel—whose longstanding major arms packages from the United States have expanded further since the Gaza war—and Egypt, which has received generous US defence funding since it signed a peace treaty with Israel in 1979.
“No new funds shall be obligated for new awards or extensions of existing awards until each proposed new award or extension has been reviewed and approved,” said the memo.
The sweeping order appears to affect everything from development assistance to military aid — including to Ukraine, which received billions of dollars in weapons under Trump’s predecessor Joe Biden as it tries to repel a Russian invasion.
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