US aid cuts to Ukraine raise risk of waste and fraud, say watchdogs
Washington (Reuters) -UsaID, according to three US guard agencies, is concerned that the Trump administration canceled independent aid monitoring agreements for Ukraine increases the risk of waste, fraud and abuse.
“The termination of third -party monitoring agreements has limited the USAID’s ability to control programs,” Pentagon and USAID inspectors, Pentagon and USAID inspectors. He said.
The US International Development Agency was the main US agency, which has been aid of civilian foreign aid for more than 60 years. It is dismantled by the Trump administration and is planned to be closed on September 2.
The three inspector presented the three -month reports of Russia to the Congress for the US’s civilian support for Ukraine in the struggle against the full -scale invasion initiated in February 2022.
In January, President Donald Trump froze all the US foreign aid programs waiting to be reviewed in accordance with the first “policies of the United States, and ordered the dismantling of the USAID, which stopped paying funds in July.
As part of this decision, billionaire Elon Musk’s government productivity, some of them supervised the end of 83 percent of the USAID programs supporting Ukraine.
Watchdogs’ report, USAID directly supports the Budget of the Ukrainian government and provides a guarantee of $ 20 billion for Kiev.
He said that 25 civilian aid programs were terminated for Ukraine in three months that ended on June 31, and that 29 active programs were transferred to the Ministry of Foreign Affairs under the orders of five and four unknown status.
The terminated programs contained contracts made with third parties that allowed the USAID funds to be monitored independently to ensure that they were spent as intended and helped to “inform the existing and future decisions”.
“The USAID said that without independent monitoring, programs were implemented in accordance with the award conditions and that he could not verify the risk of waste, fraud and abuse.” He said.
This warned, especially in the areas affected by the conflict, “there is a higher potential for the deflection of funds.”
(Reporting by Jonathan LANDAY; Editing by Clelia Oziel)
