In reply, Pakistan Prime Minister Calls US Financial Aid "very Insignificant" US President Donald Trump used his first tweet of 2018 to threaten to withhold aid to Pakistan because of what he called its "lies and deceit" over terrorism, claiming: "They give safe haven to the terrorists we hunt in Afghanistan, with little help." The President said that the US had "foolishly" given Pakistan $33 billion over the past 15 years.

The Prime Minister of Pakistan, Shahid Khaqan Abbasi has reject the US charge against Pakistan of duplicity over the fight against terrorism.

Shahid Khaqan Abbasi said that reports about the US was considering cuts of up to $2 billion in security assistance were bewildering because of the total aid Pakistan actually received was a tiny fraction of that amount.

Shahid Khaqan Abbasi has declared himself mystified by the US threats to cut off funding, saying that Washington's financial assistance was "very, very insignificant" and that Islamabad was "on the forefront of the war on terror".

In an interview with the Guardian, Mr Abbasi said that reports about the US was considering cuts of up to $2 billion in security assistance were bewildering because of the total aid Pakistan -- civilian and military -- actually received was a tiny fraction of that amount.

"I am not sure what US aid has been talked here," Mr Abbasi said in his office in Islamabad. "The aid in the last five years at least has been less than $10 million a year. It is a very, very insignificant amount. So when I read in the paper that aid at the level of $250 million or 500 or 900 has been cut, we at least are not aware of that aid."