TOKYO, Japan: United States President Donald Trump on Tuesday again stated that seven fighter jets were shot down during the brief military escalation between Pakistan and India in May, saying he helped end the conflict.
Addressing a dinner with business leaders during his visit to Japan, Trump claimed that a lot of the wars he stopped were because of his tariffs imposed on multiple countries, stating that he did “a great service to the world”.
“If you look at India and Pakistan, they were going at it,” the US President said. “Seven brand-new, beautiful planes were shot down.
“I said to [Indian] Prime Minister Modi and I said to the Prime Minister [Shehbaz Sharif], very nice man, a very good man and the Field Marshal [Asim Munir] over in Pakistan … I said, ‘look we’re not going to do any trade if you’re going to be fighting’,” Trump said.
“We said ‘no, we’re not doing any deals if you’re going to fight’ and within 24 hours that was the end of that. It was amazing, actually,” he added. “I think trade is responsible for 70 percent of the fact that we didn’t have wars.”
The May conflict, the worst between the nuclear-armed neighbours in decades, was sparked by an attack in Indian Illegally Occupied Kashmir, which New Delhi, without evidence, said was backed by Pakistan.
Pakistan has denied involvement, with the foreign ministry having questioned the credibility of India’s account of the events, saying it was “replete with fabrications”.
Both sides used fighter jets, missiles, artillery and drones during the four-day conflict, killing dozens of people, before agreeing to a ceasefire.
In the immediate aftermath of the conflict, Pakistan said it took down six Indian fighter jets during the conflict, including the French-made Rafale. New Delhi acknowledged “some losses” during the conflict but denied losing six jets.
