The United States, the largest donor in the world, froze practically all foreign aid on Friday, making exceptions only for emergency food and military funds for Israel and Egypt.
The Secretary of State, Marco Rubio, sent an internal memorandum days after President Donald Trump assumed the position of promising a policy of “first America” of restriction of assistance closely abroad.
“No new funds will be obliged by new prizes or extensions of existing awards until each new award or extension has been reviewed and approved,” the memorandum to the staff seen by AFP.
The sweeping order seems to affect everything from development assistance to military aid, even Ukraine, which received billions of dollars in arms under Trump’s predecessor, Joe Biden, while trying to repel a Russian invasion.
The directive also means a pause of at least several months of American funds to Pepfar, the anti-VIH/AIDS initiative that buys antiretroviral drugs to treat the disease in developing countries, largely in Africa.
Run under President George W. Bush in 2003, he is attributed to Pepfar to save about 26 million lives and until recently they enjoyed broad popular support along partisan lines in Washington.
But the memorandum explicitly made exceptions for military assistance to Israel, whose main weapons packages of the United States have expanded even more since the Tel Aviv military offensive in Gaza, and Egypt, which has received a generous defense financing of the defense of the defense of the defense of the United States since signed a peace treaty with Israel with Israel in 1979.
Rubio also made an exception for the contributions of the United States to emergency food assistance, which the United States has been contributing after crises worldwide, even in Sudan and Syria.
The legislators of the rival Democratic Party said that more than 20 million people trusted the medicines through Pepfar and 63 million people in the antimalant efforts financed by the United States, including networks.
“For years, Republicans in Congress have denounced what they see as a lack of American credibility in front of countries such as China, Russia and Iran,” said representative Gregory Meeks, the main democrat in the Foreign Relations Committee of the Chamber and Representative Lois Frankel.
“Now our credibility is at stake, and it seems that we will cut and flee from US commitments to our partners around the world,” they wrote in a letter.
Washington has long taken the help as a tool for its foreign policy, saying that it cares about the development and contrast with China, which is mainly concerned with looking for natural resources.
Meeks and Frankel also pointed out that the Congress appropriate by Congress and said they would seek its implementation.
‘Consequences of life or death’
The memorandum allows the State Department to make other case exceptions by case and temporarily to finance salaries to staff and other administrative expenses.
The memo requested an internal review of all foreign assistance within 85 days.
By justifying the freezing, Rubio, who as a senator was in favor of development assistance, wrote that it was impossible for the new administration to evaluate whether existing foreign aid commitments “are not duplicated, are effective and consistent with the foreign policy of the president Trump “
The United States has long been the main donor of the world in terms of dollars, although several European nations, especially in Scandinavia, give significantly more as a percentage of their economies.
The United States granted more than $ 64 billion in development assistance abroad in 2023, the last year for which records were available, according to the Organization for Economic Cooperation and Development, which advises industrialized countries.
Trump had already assumed the position on Monday signed an executive order that suspended foreign assistance for 90 days, but it was not clear how it would be implemented.
The Oxfam anti-Pobreza group said Trump was leaving a long-standing consensus in the United States for foreign assistance.
“Humanitarian and development assistance represents only around one percent of the federal budget; Save lives, fight against diseases, educate millions of children and reduce poverty, ”said Oxfam America President Abby Maxman, in a statement.
“Suspend and finally cut many of these programs could have consequences of life or death for innumerable children and families who live through the crisis,” he said.
