Congress leader Shashi Tharoor on Monday expressed his disappointment over US President Donald Trump’s recent comments regarding the India-Pakistan ceasefire. Tharoor highlighted four key concerns with Trump’s statement, which he believes undermines India’s position on the issue. Firstly, Tharoor argued that Trump’s statement creates a false equivalence between India, the victim, and Pakistan, the perpetrator. He pointed out that the US has historically maintained a firm stance against Pakistan’s documented support for cross-border terrorism, and Trump’s remarks appeared to overlook this history. “Mr Trump’s post is disappointing for India in four important ways: First, it implies a false equivalence between the victim and the perpetrator, and seemingly overlooks the US’ own past unwavering stance against Pakistan’s well-documented links to cross-border terrorism,” Tharoor said. Secondly, Tharoor took issue with Trump offering Pakistan a negotiating platform that it does not deserve. He emphasized that India would never negotiate with Pakistan under the threat of terrorism, reaffirming India’s firm stand against any form of coercion in talks. “Second, it offers Pakistan a negotiating framework which it certainly has not earned. India will never negotiate with a terrorist gun pointed at its head,” the Kerala Congressman said. Prime Minister Narendra Modi in his first remarks post-Operation Sindoor said that Indian armed forces remain poised to strike Pakistan’s terror hideouts if they were ever to become active again. The remarks come after Pakistani forces assumed an aggressive military posture after India demolished terror bases deep inside Pakistani territory and in Pakistan-occupied Kashmir (PoK) in retaliation for the Pahalgam carnage. After engaging Indian forces for four days and sustaining damages to its military and air force installations, Pakistan urged a ceasefire (which it then brazenly violated) last week. Donald Trump had sought credit for brokering the ceasefire while India said that talks were held at a bilateral level. Trump had indicated that there is an “issue” with regard to the Kashmir region and that it had gone on for “thousands of years”, disregarding the fact that Pakistan has sought to destabilize the Kashmir valley since the Partition of India in 1947. Tharoor, in response, condemned Trump’s remarks for “internationalizing” the Kashmir dispute, an outcome that aligns with the aims of terrorists seeking global attention. India has consistently rejected the notion of Kashmir being an international dispute, viewing it instead as an internal matter. “Third, it “internationalises” the Kashmir dispute, an obvious objective of the terrorists. India rejects the idea of a dispute and sees the problem as an internal affair of India’s. India has never requested, not is likely to seek, any foreign country’s mediation over its problems with Pakistan,” the Lok Sabha MP from Thiruvananthapuram said. Finally, Tharoor criticized Trump for “re-hyphenating” India and Pakistan, reversing decades of diplomatic efforts. He noted that since 2000, US Presidents had been discouraged from visiting both countries on the same trip, with President Clinton being the last to do so. Tharoor sees Trump’s comments as a major step backward in this regard. “And fourth, it “re-hyphenates” India and Pakistan in the global imagination. For decades now, world leaders had been encouraged not to club their visits to India with visits to Pakistan, and starting with President Clinton in 2000, no US President had done so. This is a major backward step,” Tharoor posted on X. In his statement, Trump had praised the leadership of both India and Pakistan for their “unwavering” stance and claimed that the US played a significant role in facilitating the ceasefire, suggesting that trade negotiations were a factor in the decision to de-escalate. Trump’s remarks included, “They were going at it hot and heavy, and it was seemingly not going to stop… we helped a lot, and we also helped with trade…” He further added that his administration’s leverage through trade was a key factor in prompting both nations to stop hostilities.