The Bush administration told Congress Tuesday that it would not officially notify the U.S. legislature of a 20-billion-U.S.-dollar arms deal with Saudi Arabia until Jan. 15, 2008.
Once Congress is officially notified, it has 30 days to review such a deal and will possibly oppose it, said the website of the Hill, a newspaper specialized in reporting congressional activities.
More than 100 House members of both parties had called for the delay in November.
The effort to seek a delay was led by Rep. Anthony Weiner (D-N.Y.), who has already drafted a joint resolution of disapproval of the arms sale.
Had Congress been officially notified of the deal in December, lawmakers were concerned that they would not have had the opportunity to thoroughly review the arms sale in light of the heavy workload Congress has to complete by the end of the year.
Capitol Hill has weighed in on past arms sales to Saudi Arabia, sometimes limiting the eventual arms packages delivered to the Saudis.
Part of the planned sale involves Joint Direct Attack Munition (JDAM) technology -- highly accurate precision arms -- which has also drawn opposition from another bipartisan group of House lawmakers.
In a letter last November, Reps. Mark Kirk (R-Ill.) and Chris Carney (D-Pa.) and 186 other lawmakers said they would oppose the sale unless they were given assurances that JDAM technology would not be used against American troops or U.S. allies and that the Bush administration would report regularly to Congress on the weapons' transfer and consult with Israel.
Source: Xinhua
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