May 16, 1998 (by Lieven Dewitte) -
U.S. Senate Intelligence Committee leaders and other key senators said Sunday they would let Pakistan have the F-16 fighter aircraft if it did not match India's nuclear test blasts.
But Pakistani Information Minister Mushahid Hussain discounted the possible unblocking of the F-16 delivery as merely a step toward righting an historical wrong. Pakistan paid more than $600 million in 1990 for 28 F-16s, but delivery of the aircraft has been blocked for more than 10 years by a congressional ban aimed at preventing Pakistan from developing nuclear weapons.
