Egypt warns U.S. against setting new conditions on its military aid

The Egyptian foreign minister Kamel Amr warned of consequences if the United States sets new conditions to the decades-old aid given to Egypt, a media report said on Friday.

Amr made these remarks in meetings with the Secretary of State Hillary Rodham Clinton and Defense Secretary Leon E. Panetta and White House officials.

Amr’s warnings came after a Senate bill that proposes the withholding of up to $1.3 billion in U.S. aid for 2012 until Clinton makes sure that Egypt has held democratic elections and is protecting freedoms of the press, expression and associations.

Clinton however rejected the Senate Appropriations Committee’s drive to make the aid conditional, and said at a news conference on Wednesday that “we don’t want to do anything that draws into question our relationship or our support.”

“We will be working very hard . . . to convince Congress that that is not the best approach to take,” she added.

Meanwhile, a senior Egyptian official, speaking on the condition of anonymity to The Washington Post said that his government is calling on U.S. officials to intervene as they understood “the value of the partnership between the United States and Egypt and how such conditions and language would be detrimental to future cooperation.

“If you insert new conditions, hinting at the fact that the military aid might be touched in the future, this signals to the Egyptian military [that] the United States is not as solidly behind us as we think,” the Egyptian official added.

Egypt is the second-largest recipient of U.S. aid since signing a peace treaty with Israel in 1979.

However, it has complained about an increase in American aid to non-governmental groups, but U.S. officials explain their move is to support and train aspiring politicians as parliamentary elections approach on November 28.