House Republicans added the Compacts of Free Association (Cofa) to their newly prepared ‘countering Communist China’ bill amid a months-long delay in approving promised funds for three strategically vital US-allied Pacific island nations.
A congressional budget impasse has hindered funding for the Marshall Islands, Micronesia and Palau, but that could change if the draft bill by the Republican study committee, a group of more than 150 conservative lawmakers, were to pass.
