Kuwait City: The US reaffirmed Tuesday commitment to providing life-saving aid to people in need across the globe after cutting funding of some of the WFP programs. "First of all, 85 percent of previously existing USAID programs with the World Food Program worldwide remain active and ongoing," State Department Spokesperson Tammy Bruce said in a press briefing.
According to Kuwait News Agency, Bruce emphasized that it is inaccurate to claim that USAID has defunded the World Food Program entirely. She clarified that the US has not broadly withdrawn from its commitments to providing lifesaving food aid. "We've said from the beginning that our commitment to foreign aid remains. It may look different than it has in the past, but in this case, 85 percent of those USAID programs with the World Food Program worldwide remain active," she noted.
Bruce further explained that the US has terminated a limited number of World Food Program initiatives based on specific country or program-level priorities. "But what is the story here is that the largest group of World Food Program awards terminated were in Yemen and Afghanistan through an executive order that was issued based on concern that the funding was benefiting terrorist groups, including the Houthis and the Taliban," she argued.