US puts pressure on Pak! Withholds its assistance until Islamabad release Dr Shakil Afridi who helps CIA to nab Osama Bin Laden

Washington DC, December 28: In an effort to put pressure on the Pakistani government, the US Senate passed the fiscal year 2023 budget, which states that America will withhold aid to Pakistan until Islamabad releases Dr Shakil Afridi, a person who assisted the CIA in locating Osama Bin Laden, from prison.

 

The United States Senate passed the fiscal year 2023 budget on Tuesday, (December 27). As per the bill, Pakistan can use American funds provided under the "foreign military financing programme" only for counterterrorism.

"Of the funds appropriated under titles Ill and IV of this Act that are made available for assistance for Pakistan, $33,000,000 shall be withheld from obligation until the Secretary of State reports to the Committees on Appropriations that Dr Shakil Afridi has been released from prison and cleared of all charges relating to the assistance provided to the United States in locating Osama bin Laden," Passed bill said.

For unreserved, Dr Shakil Afridi, a doctor who helped the CIA track down Osama bin Laden in his Abbottabad compound. Doctor was arrested by authorities weeks after the deadly assault on Bin Laden's home. He has been languishing in a prison in the city of Peshawar for almost eleven years.

He was never found guilty of anything linked to the raid, but convicted by a tribal court under an obscure colonial-era law of providing money to an insurgent group and handed a 33-year sentence.