Rep. Gary Ackerman (R-NY)

It was not just the Government of India that was caught off-guard by Secretary of State Colin Powell’s announcement at the end of March, that Washington plans giving Pakistan Major Non-Nato Ally (MNNA) status. South Asia experts, analysts, talking heads, and the community in general in this country, were taken aback and ad hoc in their opposition to such a step.

New York Democratic Rep. Gary Ackerman, on March 24, however, immediately introduced legislation to prevent such a status being given. H.R. 4021 is aimed at amending the Foreign Assistance Act of 1961, requiring that only countries that have a democratic form of government and that support United States nonproliferation objectives may be designated as major non-NATO allies for purposes of that Act and the Arms Export Control Act. The bill has been referred to the House Committee on International Relations.

Following that, again led by Rep. Ackerman, a slew of legislators have written to President Bush urging him to refrain and reconsider making Pakistan MNNA, and to provide them more information on why he took such a decision. “While we recognize that Pakistan has provided invaluable support to the United States in the global war on terrorism, we believe that there are too many unanswered questions regarding Khan’s nuclear proliferation activities to warrant designating Pakistan at this time.”

They noted that the waiver of sanctions and a $2-billion economic and military assistance package, “is sufficient recognition” of Pakistan’s help in the war on terror, and questioned Pakistan President Pervez Musharraf’s claim that there was no government involvement in trading nuclear and missile technology. “We are aware that certain members of the House have been briefed on this matter by senior Administration officials. Nevertheless, we ask that you make that briefing available to us, so that we could draw our own conclusions regarding Pakistan government’s complicity in providing nuclear technology to State sponsors of terrorism.”

The signatories to the letter besides Ackerman were: Democratic Reps. Bob Menendez, and Frank Pallone (both from New jersey) D-NJ, Tom Lantos, Juanita Millender-McDonald, and Barbara Lee (all three from California) Rahm Emmanuel from Illinois, Rep. Betty McCollum, Minnesota; Rep. John F. Tierney and Bill Delahunt of Massachusetts, Tammy Baldwin from Wisconsin, Peter Deutsch from Florida and Joe Crowley, Jose Serrano, Michael McNulty, Eliot Engel, Tim Bishop, Carolyn Maloney, Anthony Weiner, and Steve Israel (all eight from New York).