Donald Trump pivots to Pakistan in biggest US tilt since 1971

The TOI correspondent from Washington: US President Donald Trump met Pakistan’s Prime Minister Shahbaz Sharif and Army Chief Asim Munir in the White House Oval Office on Thursday in an extraordinary public embrace of a country he had derided as a deceitful terrorist haven over much of his private and political career, including during his first term.

The White House did not release any details of the meeting, nor were there any statements or readouts, much less a press conference in the hours after the unusual engagement that included "Field Marshal" Munir, regarded as the country’s de facto ruler. But Islamabad was as voluble as Washington was silent on what was a closed-door meeting except for the gauzy photos.

In a series of social media posts, the Pakistan government said two leaders "discussed enhancing cooperation on regional security and counter-terrorism" and Sharif thanked Trump "for his open support of Pakistan's role in counter-terrorism and emphasised the need to further increase security and intelligence cooperation." Sharif also invited US Companies to invest in Pakistan's agriculture, IT, mines, resources, and energy sectors, and invited Trump to visit Pakistan "at his convenience," it said.

Pakistan later laid it on thick with the US president in Sharif’s address before the UNGA, describing Trump as a "champion of peace." Pakistan has nominated him for the Nobel Peace Prize and "it was the least we could do," Sharif said.

Officially, the US said nothing about the meeting, not even dignifying it with a statement or a social media post. A clutch of photos released by the Pakistani government showed Sharif and Munir seated in the gilded Oval Office for talks that were said to have lasted 80 minutes, and later posing with a grinning Trump with his characteristic thumbs-up gesture.

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Trump appeared to be showing a mock up of the White House in a third photo, and in a fourth, Secretary of State Marco Rubio is seen guffawing with the Pakistani leaders.

The US president also conspicuously wore a pin of a fighter jet along with the trademark American flag. While Pakistan partisans claimed he wore the pin to recognise its downing of Indian aircraft during the recent war, it turned out that he wore it earlier in the day for his meeting with Turkish President Erdovan to underscore sale of F-16s and F-35s to Ankara.

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Shortly before the Pakistan meeting, Trump had boasted about American military manufacturing prowess and said foreign leaders and generals were lining up to visit US factories to buy equipment, without specifically mentioning Pakistan. Erdogan, the leader of Turkey, a Nato ally, had met Trump earlier in the day and Washington has been hawking its military wares to him too.