US President Donald Trump, while addressing a press conference with UK prime minister Keir Starmer at the White House, shut a reporter down who asked a question about whether the two leaders discussed Canada.
The reporter asked the UK PM whether he discussed with President Trump about his statements over annexing Canada. “Has the King expressed any concern over the President’s apparent desire to remove one of his realms from his control?” the reporter asked.
To this, Starmer replied, “I think you’re trying to find a divide between us that doesn’t exist. We’re the closest of nations and we had very good discussions today but we didn’t touch Canada.” Interrupting the UK PM before he could finish his statement, Trump told the reporter, “That’s enough”.
The two state leaders had met to primarily discuss support for Ukraine and also trade ties. Trump hosted UK PM Keir Starmer, and the two discussed the United States’ stance on ending the three-year-long war in Ukraine.
Discussions on Ukraine War
Reiterating that the war would never have happened had he been the President, Trump said, “To begin the process of ending this spiral of death, I had historic back-to-back calls with President Putin, very successful calls I might add, and President Zelensky…We’re working very hard to get that war brought to an end.”
The United States’ stance on Russia took a turn under Trump when the two countries met to discuss an end to the war without involving Ukraine on the discussion table. Trump also pinned the blame on Zelensky for starting the war, saying that he could have struck a deal with Russia.
While Trump took a softer tone on the matter with UK PM Keir Starmer, he didn’t say much about the US “backstop” that the European countries are seeking, reported news agency AFP.
“It’ll either be fairly soon or it won’t be at all,” Trump said while talking about ending the Ukraine conflict.
Keir Starmer, on the other hand, vouched for a peace deal in Ukraine that does not “reward” Russia. “There’s a famous slogan in the United Kingdom from after the Second World War, that is that we have to win the peace, and that’s what we must do now. Because it can’t be a peace that rewards the aggressor ,” he said.
