Afghan president says he has assurances that CIA payments will continue

KABUL, Afghanistan – Afghan President Hamid Karzai says the director of the CIA assured him that regular funding his government receives from the agency will not be cut off.

He says Afghanistan has been receiving such funding for more than 10 years and expressed hope at a Saturday news conference that it will not stop.

He confirmed earlier in the week that his government had received such payments following a story published in The New York Times that said the CIA had given the Afghan National Security Council tens of millions of dollars in monthly payments.

Karzai would not say how much assistance his government had received because it was being used for intelligence work, but said monthly receipts had been given to the CIA.