USANews版 - Trump’s Very Strange Phone Call |
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发帖数: 897 | 1 An entire subcontinent is currently scratching its head over a read-out
issued by the Pakistani government of a phone call on Monday between Donald
Trump and Pakistani Prime Minister Nawaz Sharif:
Prime Minister Muhammad Nawaz Sharif called President-elect USA Donald
Trump and felicitated him on his victory. President Trump said Prime
Minister Nawaz Sharif you have a very good reputation. You are a terrific
guy. You are doing amazing work which is visible in every way. I am looking
forward to see you soon. As I am talking to you Prime Minister, I feel I am
talking to a person I have known for long. Your country is amazing with
tremendous opportunities. Pakistanis are one of the most intelligent people.
I am ready and willing to play any role that you want me to play to address
and find solutions to the outstanding problems. It will be an honor and I
will personally do it. Feel free to call me any time even before 20th
January that is before I assume my office.
On being invited to visit Pakistan by the Prime Minister, Mr. Trump said
that he would love to come to a fantastic country, fantastic place of
fantastic people. Please convey to the Pakistani people that they are
amazing and all Pakistanis I have known are exceptional people, said Mr.
Donald Trump.
Clearly, there’s some garbled paraphrasing and editing here—I’m assuming
Sharif also said a thing or two—and according to the Washington Post, the
Trump transition team hasn’t responded to requests for corroboration, but
it certainly sounds like Trump’s very distinctive cadence and vocabulary.
Given what’s been released about his other conversations with world leaders
, the tone here wouldn’t be out of character. Another example: his informal
invitation to British Prime Minister Theresa May to “let me know” if she
happened to be traveling to the U.S.
It would be unusual for the president-elect to talk to any foreign leader
this way, and particularly Sharif given the complicated and tense
relationship between the United States and Pakistan. The country is a major
recipient of U.S. military aid but its security services are also widely
believed to be backing anti-American insurgent groups, including the Taliban
. It’s the sort of situation that any president should approach only with
extreme caution.
Trump’s lavish praise for Pakistan has predictably made headlines in
Pakistan’s rival India. The Times of India reports that a spokesman for
India’s foreign ministry has issued the “deadpan” response: “We look
forward to the president-elect helping Pakistan address the most outstanding
of its outstanding issues—terrorism.”
During the campaign, Trump—a self-proclaimed “big fan of Hindu”—promised
the U.S. would be “best friends” with India under his administration and
praised Prime Minister Narendra Modi. He’s also acquired an odd cult
following among hardline Hindu nationalists, who are likely now miffed that
the man they counted on to be an anti-Islamic crusader has such nice things
to say about their most hated enemy. The Indian media is suggesting this is
some kind of flip-flop for Trump. He did once tweet, back in 2012, "Get it
straight: Pakistan is not our friend. We've given them billions and billions
of dollars, and what did we get? Betrayal and disrespect - and much worse.
#TimeToGetTough".
As Akbar Shahid Ahmed of the Huffington Post writes, we should be worried
less about what Trump’s plans for South Asia are than the fact that he
likely doesn’t have any. Typically, presidents-elect get State Department
briefings before speaking with foreign leaders, but Trump has reportedly
been turning those down. It’s all been very casual. Assuming the transcript
is mostly accurate, then, it seems safe to assume that Trump was just
buttering Sharif up without giving much thought to the sensitivities
involved in a very tense geopolitical conflict or how his words might be
interpreted. Which makes the story both pretty amusing—and scary. |
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