United States President Barack Obama will "shortly sign" the Kerry-Lugar Bill on civilian and military aid to Islamabad to which Pakistani Army and its opposition parties have expressed reservations.
"The Congress has passed the Kerry-Lugar authorisation for Pakistani assistance which the President will sign quite -- very shortly," White House spokesman Robert Gibbs told reporters at his daily press briefing.
As part of the administration's transparency, the Bill has been posted online, he said.
"We posted the bill online. I don't know when the five-day period that we've talked about expires, but the President, whenever that is, will sign that legislation," he said, adding the concerns about the bill in Pakistan would be discussed at the 'situation room meeting' of Obama.
The Kerry-Lugar Bill was passed by both the US House of Representatives and the Senate last week and now has been sent to the White House for Obama to sign it into law, for which he has 10 days under the constitutional provisions. The Office of Management of Budget takes five days to prepare the bill for signing and it is being worked.
Earlier Pakistani Army chief General Ashfaq Parvez Kayani had a meeting with his top commanders at Army headquarters in Rawalpindi in which the officers expressed concern over some "strings attached to the Bill undermining the country's sovereignty".
The Bill has provisions which link Pakistan's progress in its fight against terrorism to any military aid to that country.
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