Washington: President Donald Trump speaks during a meeting with Pakistani Prime Minister Imran Khan in the Oval Office of the White House, Monday, July 22, 2019, in Washington. (AP/PTI Photo)Afghanistan President Ashraf Ghani Tuesday demanded a clarification from US President Donald Trump for his remarks about Afghanistan where he claimed that he could win the Afghan war within 10 days by wiping out Afghanistan but he did not want to take the route which would kill 10 million people.
In a statement, the Afghan presidential palace said, “The Afghan nation has not and will never allow any foreign power to determine its fate,” adding that “While the Afghan government supports the U.S. efforts for ensuring peace in Afghanistan, the government underscores that foreign heads of state cannot determine Afghanistan’s fate in absence of the Afghan leadership.”
Trump’s comments followed a meeting with Pakistan Prime Minister Imran Khan at the White House on Monday.
During his comments in Washington, Trump said that Pakistan was helping the United States “extricate” itself from Afghanistan, where the United States was acting as a “policeman” rather than fighting a war.
“If we wanted to fight a war in Afghanistan and win it, I could win that war in a week. I just don’t want to kill 10 million people,” Trump told reporters at the White House.
Claiming that he could wipe Afghanistan off the face of the Earth, Trump also said, “I have plans on Afghanistan that, if I wanted to win that war, Afghanistan would be wiped off the face of the Earth. It would be gone.”
“It would be over in — literally, in 10 days. And I don’t want to do — I don’t want to go that route,” he further claimed.
On Monday, during the meeting with Khan, Trump had also claimed that Prime Minister Narendra Modi had asked him to mediate on Kashmir. Soon after Trump’s remarks on Kashmir, a tweet from the MEA spokesperson Raveesh Kumar cleared the air, denying that Modi said any such thing to Trump.
“We have seen @POTUS’s remarks to the press that he is ready to mediate, if requested by India & Pakistan, on Kashmir issue. No such request has been made by PM @narendramodi to US President. It has been India’s consistent position that all outstanding issues with Pakistan are discussed only bilaterally. Any engagement with Pakistan would require an end to cross border terrorism. The Shimla Agreement & the Lahore Declaration provide the basis to resolve all issues between India & Pakistan bilaterally,” MEA stated.
