Trump holds closed door meeting with Shehbaz Sharif, Asim Munir at the Oval Office

US President Donald Trump had a closed door meeting with Pakistani Prime Minister Shehbaz Sharif and army chief, Field Marshal Asim Munir. Trump’s audience to Sharif and Munir is indicative of the warming ties between Washington and Islamabad. 

Sharif, accompanied by Munir, arrived at the West Executive Avenue entrance just before 5pm. They were welcomed by senior administration officials. 

The meeting, closed to the press, was Sharif’s first meeting with a US president. He is the first prime minister to visit the Oval Office since Imran Khan’s visit in July 2019.

The talks are expected to have covered a wide agenda, including bilateral relations, trade, regional security, and global challenges.

For Sharif,  the visit capped a busy week in the United States, as he already joined leaders from eight Arab and Muslim nations in a meeting with Trump on the sidelines of the UN General Assembly, focused on ending the Israel-Hamas war in Gaza. Earlier in New York, he addressed the UN Climate Summit and is scheduled to deliver Pakistan’s formal speech to the Assembly on Friday.

This was, however, not Munir’s first visit, who was hosted at the White House for lunch in June. It was shortly after this that Sharif nominated Trump for a Nobel Peace Prize, for his role in negotiating the ceasefire between India and Pakistan. 

Trump had publicly praised both Sharif and Munir as “great leaders”. “We have a great leader coming, the Prime Minister of Pakistan and the Field Marshal. Field Marshal is a very great guy, and so is the Prime Minister, both, and they’re coming, and they may be in this room right now,” he said, ahead of the meeting.

While the US is warming up to Pakistan, the ties between New Delhi and Washington have somewhat frozen. At the core of the tension is India’s purchase of Russian oil, which the US has demanded New Delhi should abandon. Trump and his administration is of the view that India is supporting the Russian economy, which in turn is dragging on the Ukraine war. Trump imposed 25 per cent tariffs on India for its Russian oil purchases over the 25 per cent ‘retaliatory’ tariffs, taking the overall tariffs to 50 per cent.