Afghan President Hamid Karzai acknowledged Monday that his office receives large cash payments from Iran, but said the money is a transparent form of aid.
President Karzai told reporters in Kabul Monday that Iran has given his office up to $975,000 for government expenses. He said the transactions were not secret and no different from cash payments from the United States.
President Karzai's comments were in response to an article in The New York Times that his chief of staff, Umar Daudzai, has been receiving payments from Iran to "promote Iran's interests" in Afghanistan's presidential palace.
Mr. Karzai said Daudzai had been accepting the money on the Afghan leader's instructions. The Times quotes unnamed sources saying Iran uses its influence to "drive a wedge" between the Afghans and their American and NATO benefactors.
The Iranian embassy in Afghanistan on Monday dismissed the report as "ridiculous and insulting."
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