Trump says US brokered India, Pakistan ceasefire through trade

As President Donald Trump delivered a speech in Saudi Arabia after he signed multiple deals with the country's leader Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman, he talked about how the US leveraged trade in order to get a peace deal brokered between India and Pakisan. 

"Just days ago, my administration successfully brokered a historic ceasefire to stop the escalating violence between India and Pakistan, and I used trade to a large extent to do it," Trump said. 

"I said, 'Fellas, come on, let's make a deal. Let's do some trading. Let's not trade nuclear missiles. Let's trade the things that you make so beautifully. And they both have very powerful leaders, very strong leaders, good leaders, smart leaders. And it all stopped. Hopefully it'll remain that way, but it all stopped," Trump added. 

He went on to give accolades to Secretary of State Marco Rubio as well as Vice President JD Vance, and then suggested that the two countries were getting along so well that the leaders could go get dinner together. "Millions of people could have died from that conflict that started off small. It was getting bigger and bigger and bigger by the day," Trump added. 

The comments from Trump come after Pakistan and India came to a ceasefire mediated by the United States over the weekend, with some small skirmishes taking place afterwards. Although Trump has said that the peace talks were mediated through trade, India's foreign ministry spokesman Randhir Jaiswal has contradicted the comments, and said, “The issue of trade did not come up in any of these discussions,” per the AP. 

On Monday, Trump had made similar comments to reporters, and said, “I said, come on, we’re going to do a lot of trade with you guys. Let’s stop it. Let’s stop it. If you stop it, we’ll do a trade. If you don’t stop it, we’re not going to do any trade.'"

“And all of a sudden, they said, I think we’re going to stop,” Trump added at the time. “For a lot of reasons, but trade is a big one."