The US Secretary of State, Hillary Clinton, has rejected the compliant of Pakistani President Asif Ali Zardari about the lapse in providing aid to Pakistan in order to deal with the aftermath of the Swat operation. In a recent interview, President Zardari had told The New York Review of Books that Pakistan did not have sufficient funds for managing the consequences of the Swat operation and that the US was not responding in time to the humanitarian crisis in Pakistan.

Rejecting Mr. Zardari’s complaint, Mrs. Clinton told USA Today that the US had already disbursed $110 million for the internally displaced People (IDPs) of Pakistan. She added that the US has been providing aid but it may be moving more quickly than perhaps the president knows. Mrs. Clinton also expressed satisfaction on the performance of Pakistan army against Taliban as manifest in the recent take over of Swat’s main city Mingora.

On Tuesday, the State Department announced the news of nearly 6000 Americans contributing $5 each, through text messaging, in response to Mrs. Clinton’s appeal for helping Pakistan’s IDPs. An amount of $135, 000 was thus raised by the contributions. US special envoy to Afghanistan and Pakistan, Richard Holbrooke, has also flown to Pakistan for assessing the situation of the war-affected IDPs and speeding up the relief efforts directed toward them.