“There has evidently been some kind of slippage here.” an official said.
To Karachi in August
The Padma, the ship that was preparing to sail from New York, in scheduled to arrive in Karachi in Mid-August with a cargo that is said to include eight aircraft, parachutes and hundreds of thousands of pounds of spare parts and accessories for place and military vehicles . The Sunderbans, another ship of Pakistani registry', sailed from New York on May 8 with other items of military equipment, for Pakistan, including pans for armored personnel carriers, according to the ship's manifesto and the accompanying State Department export license. She is due to arrive in Karachi Wednesday.
All this equipment has been sold to Pakistan by the United States Air force under provisions of the Foreign Military Sales Act.
After troops of the Pakistani Army, mainly West Pakistanis, were ordered to crush the liberation movements in East Pakistan last March 25, the State Department announced that all sales of military equipment to Pakistan had been suspended and that the program, initiated in 1967, had been placed “under review.”
Today, Slate Department officials, responding to queries about the sailings of the Padma and the Sunderbans, said that it retained the official policy of the Administration that sales of all types of military equipment to Pakistan were prohibited under the ban imposed shortly after the severe repression of the East Pakistani independence movement began early in the spring. The State Department estimates that at least 200,000 East Pakistanis have died in the subsequent fighting and that about six million refugees have fled to India.
Senior State Department officials said in interviews today that they were not aware of shipments of military equipment to Pakistan after March 25.
They acknowledged that such shipments would constitute a violation of the proclaimed policy.
The State Department officials said they had been informed by the Defense Department that no military equipment under the foreign sales program had been delivered “to the Government of Pakistan or agents of the Government of Pakistan” since March 25.
No Explanation Offered
They said the Defense Department “reaffirmed” this policy today in discussions with the State Department. They could not explain how this Pentagon statement could be reconciled with the fact that, according to the bills of lading submitted to the Pakistani Embassy here, the equipment to be loaded on the Sunderbans was received at the dock in New York on April 23 and the equipment for the Padma on May 21.
