U.S. Expects to Give Afghans $300 Million in 2003

Wed Feb 13, 5:53 PM ET

WASHINGTON (Reuters) - The United States expects to give Afghanistan about $300 million in fiscal year 2003, on top of the $296 million it has pledged for this year, Secretary of State Colin Powell said on Wednesday.

The Bush administration's budget request for 2003 includes only $140 million for Afghanistan, but Powell said that was just a preliminary figure prepared at short notice.

"I fully expect that in the course of this year we will have a requirement for something in the neighborhood of $300 million again," he told a House of Representatives committee.

"We have identified the $140 million ... and we will have to come back for something in the neighborhood of a like or larger amount in the course of this year," he said.

"I have not yet been cleared to do that but the president (George W. Bush) is committed to provide a strong level of support to the interim authority and the next government that is coming along in a few months' time," he added.

The United States began bombing Afghanistan in October to punish Saudi-born fugitive Osama bin Laden and his al Qaeda network, blamed for the Sept. 11 attacks on the United States. The campaign helped topple Afghanistan's ruling Taliban, which had harbored bin Laden.

The interim government now in place in Afghanistan has said it needs billions to rebuild a country devastated by war and drought.

The United States made the pledge of $296 million at a donors conference on reconstructing Afghanistan, held in Tokyo in January. The conference pledged a total of $4.5 billion, with some of the amount spread over several years, to help Afghanistan rebuild after two decades of war.

The U.S. fiscal year 2003 begins on Oct. 1, 2002.