India takes dig at Pak claims over Trump call
NEW DELHI: The Indian government has said it is looking forward to US President-elect Donald Trump addressing what it referred to as Pakistan’s ‘most outstanding of outstanding problems’ – terrorism. The tongue-in-cheek comment came in response to questions over Pakistan’s claims that made it appear that Trump had offered to side with Pakistan in its unsolved issues. “We have seen the reports of the conversation (between Trump and Pakistan PM Nawaz Sharif) that were one-sided and claimed the President-elect promised to help Pakistan with all outstanding issues,” said Ministry of External Affairs spokesperson Vikas Swarup, when asked about the statement that was issued by the Pakistan government that hinted that Trump would be willing to intervene on Pakistan’s behalf. “We look forward to the President-elect helping Pakistan address the most outstanding of its outstanding issues – terrorism,” Swarup added in deadpan.
Trump spoke over the phone on Wednesday. What was said during that call is what’s at issue,” CNN commented.
“After the conversation, the Pakistan Prime Minister’s Office put out a statement directly quoting Trump – a violation of diplomatic protocol – in which he glowingly praised Sharif,” the network said.
Readouts of phone calls between world leaders are usually written in a safe way in order to protect them from incidental backlash – like the one the Trump team put out, it said.
“They’re dry and diplomatic statements summing up conversations using carefully chosen buzzwords,” it said, adding that such calls themselves are usually quite formal.
“A president wouldn’t gush over a foreign leader the way that Donald Trump did. He wouldn’t volunteer to do all these things,” says CNN political analyst David Gergen, who has served as an adviser to four
presidents.
He added: “Our relationship with Pakistan is one of the most sensitive and difficult relationships in the world. It’s an extremely important relationship.”
When making that call, a president would likely have a press aide and national security advisers at his side, according to Gergen. “You’d carefully think through any call like that, you’d make your two or three points, [then] over and out,” he said.
“Especially don’t leave them in a position where they could put out something so gushing that it hurts your relationship with India,” he added.
The Washington Post, in its report on the Sharif-trump conversation, said, the Pakistani readout is “unusual in that it focuses almost entirely on Trump’s contributions to the conversation, and reproduces them in a voice that is unmistakably his.”
“Lavishing praise on the