Backgrounder: What are the United States’ Options for Suspending Egypt’s Aid?

[Donnachaidh]

http://www.propublica.org/blog/item/explainer-what-are-the-united-states-options-for-revoking-egypts-aid1



Several American lawmakers <1> have called for the U.S. to cut or suspend its foreign aid to Egypt. That aid, as we’ve noted <2>, has been a decades-long symbol of the U.S. government’s support for Egyptian President Hosni Mubarak, whose years of repression are fueling these ongoing mass protests.

But can the U.S. government even cut aid?

Several reports have said that the aid is “tied to <3> the Arab nation’s 1979 peace agreement with Israel,” or that the U.S. “promised aid to Egypt <4> in return for maintaining the agreement.” Wikipedia describes the aid as being “part of the agreement <5>.”

“That’s not the case,” a State Department spokeswoman told me. There’s no treaty that “obligates the U.S. to provide assistance to Egypt.”

More at the link --