Washington, July 28(ANI): United States Secretary of State Hillary Clinton has warned Congress that she will fight to block a Republican effort to restrict aid for Israel's neighbours, Pakistan and leftist-led Latin American nations.
US House Foreign Affairs Committee had earlier approved a bill that would cut 6.4 billion dollars from President Barack Obama's budget requests and impose restrictions in controversial areas such as abortion and climate change.
Clinton expressed "profound concern" in a letter to the committee's Republican Chairperson Ileana Ros-Lehtinen, and said she would recommend that President Barack Obama should veto it if it reaches him.
The restrictions in the bill "would be debilitating to my efforts to carry out a considered foreign policy and diplomacy, and to use foreign assistance strategically to that end," the Daily Times quoted a letter, as saying.
"Should this bill be presented to the President, I will recommend personally that he veto the bill," the letter read.
But even without a veto, it remains unclear whether the bill would survive.
Obama and Clinton's Democratic Party retained control of the Senate after losing the House of Representatives elections last year.
The House committee had earlier approved the spending bill along party lines after a two-day debate in which Republicans suggested that the United States, which was on the brink of defaulting on its debt, needed to cut foreign spending and toughen its line against its rivals.
The House bill would bar defence aid to Egypt, Lebanon, the Palestinian Authority and Yemen if Islamist groups such as the Muslim Brotherhood, Hezbollah and Hamas become a part of the government. (ANI)
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