Asked why money that was used for what would appear to be justifiable governing and charitable expenses was handed over secretly by the C.I.A. and not routed publicly through the State Department, Mr. Karzai replied: “This is cash. It is the choice of the U.S. government.”

He added, “If tomorrow the State Department decides to give us such cash, I’d welcome that, too.”

Mr. Karzai declined to specify how much cash his office received each month, or how much it had been given by the C.I.A. so far. At his meeting with the station chief, it was made clear to him that “we are not allowed to disclose” the amount, he said.

Current and former Afghan officials who spoke before last week said the payments had totaled tens of millions of dollars since they began a decade ago.

The American Embassy in Kabul, which handles queries for the C.I.A., declined to comment.

But it was Mr. Karzai’s acknowledgment that some of the money had been given to “political elites” that was most likely to intensify concerns about the cash and how it is used.

In Afghanistan, the political elite includes many men more commonly described as warlords, people with ties to the opium trade and to organized crime, along with lawmakers and other senior officials. Many were the subjects of American-led investigations that yielded reams of intelligence and evidence but almost no significant prosecutions by the Afghan authorities.

Mr. Karzai did not address those concerns on Saturday. He instead emphasized that no one group or political faction was given special treatment.

“Yes, sometimes Afghanistan’s political elites have some needs, they have requested our help and we have helped them,” Mr. Karzai said. “But we have not spent it to strengthen a particular political movement. It’s not like that. It has been given to individuals.”