Washington:
Islamabad has failed to convince the Obama administration to change the conditions in the aid Bill that has kicked up a storm in Pakistan.
Pakistan Foreign Minister Shah Mahmood Qureshi, who rushed to Washington, pushed hard for changes during his meetings with top US officials and the Senator who sponsored the Kerry-Lugar Bill but managed to get only an assurance of a written clarification.
Democratic Senator John Kerry, who co-sponsored the aid Bill, said lawmakers would prepare an explanatory statement to accompany the Bill for US President Barack Obama's signature into law.
Qureshi pressed lawmakers and the Obama administration for the assurances just a week after he was in Washington praising the aid package.
Qureshi said he wanted Congress, which has already approved the Bill, to address worries about the Bill compromising Pakistan's sovereignty.
The Bill would provide Pakistan with one and a half billion US dollars a year over the next five years to spend on democratic, economic and social development programmes.
But Pakistan's military has objected to language that links money for counter-terrorism assistance to Pakistan cracking down on militancy and meeting other conditions.
Nothing in the Bill, Kerry said, impinges on Pakistan's sovereignty, and no conditions are attached to the non-military aid.
"There certainly is no intent to micro-manage," Kerry said.
Kerry suggested that the explanatory statement could be agreed upon by Wednesday; congressional staff members said it was unclear when Obama would sign the Bill.
Qureshi also met with the Obama administration's top envoy for Pakistan and Afghanistan, Richard Holbrooke, and planned talks with other senior lawmakers and with White House officials.
Many in Pakistan say that the conditions in the legislation compromise the country's sovereignty.
The controversy over the Kerry Lugar Bill has yet again highlighted the ideological difference between Pakistan's powerful army and its weak civilian government regarding relations with the United States.
With the war in Afghanistan, being President Obama's top priority, Washington needs the Pakistani military help to prevent militants crossing the border into Afghanistan to fight US-led forces there.
The question now is: whether to align with the powerful military to combat the militancy or take the principled stand in support of a weak democracy.