Kuwait Cancels Anti-Israel Aid to PLO, 2 Nations

The Kuwaiti Parliament on Wednesday canceled $340 million worth of military aid earmarked for Syria, Jordan and the Palestine Liberation Organization because current aid is being misused, the Kuwaiti News Agency said.

The National Assembly voted 32 to 18 in a closed session to stop the allocation of 100 million dinars, or $340 million, due to be granted for the period from July, 1985, to July, 1986, to help the two countries and the PLO fight Israel, the agency said.

The Parliament’s financial and economic affairs committee recommended termination of the aid last week on grounds that it is being misused, the agency said. There was no further explanation.

There has been speculation that the committee’s recommendation may have inspired two bomb explosions in Kuwait on July 11 that killed eight people and injured 88.

A shadowy Muslim guerrilla group, the Arab Revolutionary Brigades, claimed responsibility Friday for the blasts in two seaside cafes and demanded that Kuwaiti authorities “give up their policies hostile to Arab and Palestinian nationals.”

During the three-hour session Wednesday, the assembly also voted to nearly double financial aid to “Arab and friendly countries” to the equivalent of $450 million.

This oil-rich Persian Gulf state originally pledged the military aid to the so-called “front-line states” against Israel--Syria, Jordan and the PLO--at the 1978 Arab summit in the Iraqi capital, Baghdad.

The money was part of a total of $30 billion that Kuwait, Saudi Arabia and five other oil-producing states promised to pay Syria, Jordan and the PLO.

Kuwaiti lawmakers complained recently that other parties to the Baghdad summit had not made their promised payments.

Under the government’s original budget proposal, Syria would have received 57 million dinars, or $194 million, while Jordan and the PLO would have received 43 million dinars, or $146 million.

There was no immediate reaction from Syria, Jordan or the PLO. Kuwaiti aid for the three was cut from $561 million last year to $340 million because of declining oil revenues.