US president Donald Trump will reportedly visit Pakistan in September before travelling on to India, months after claiming credit for ending a conflict between the two countries.
If confirmed, the visit would be the first by a US president to Pakistan since George W Bush in 2006.
Two local TV news channels said that Mr Trump will land in Pakistan, and then continue on to India. That ordering of the visit is likely to ruffle feathers in New Delhi, which has enjoyed an increasingly close relationship with Washington in recent years. The Independent has reached out to the White House for a confirmation.
A US embassy spokesperson in Islamabad told Reuters: "We have nothing to announce". A spokesperson for Pakistan's foreign ministry said they were unaware of the developments.
Ties between the US and Pakistan have been strong since Mr Trump began his second term, with the Republican hosting Pakistan's hugely influential army chief Field Marshal Asim Munir at the White House last month.
Islamabad returned the favour by announcing its intention to recommend Mr Trump for the Nobel Peace Prize, citing his role in de-escalating the recent four-day conflict between India and Pakistan.
Mr Trump has openly expressed his desire to win the Nobel, and has repeatedly lamented what he views as a lack of credit for his diplomatic efforts. In one social media post, Mr Trump rued: "I won’t get a Nobel Peace Prize no matter what I do."
Whether or not Mr Trump is responsible for shutting down the rising tensions between the two South Asian nations earlier this year is disputed. India and Pakistan exchanged heavy fire for four straight days, starting 7 May, in their worst conflict in more than a quarter century, launching missiles and drones at each other’s military bases and leaving dozens of people dead.
In the months since, Mr Trump has claimed about two dozen times to have brokered a ceasefire between the two – his surprise announcement preceded an end to the confrontation and Pakistan has hailed him for his efforts.
Mr Trump claims he dangled the prospect of US trade deals to convince both sides to stop firing, and that his actions saved millions of lives. This week the president said: “We’ve been very successful in settling wars.”
“India, by the way, Pakistan would have been a nuclear war within another week, the way that was going. That was going very badly, and we did that through trade. I said, ‘we’re not going to talk to you about trade unless you get this thing settled,’ and did, and they were both great, great leaders, and they were great.”
New Delhi, however, has denied Mr Trump played a pivotal role and says the ceasefire decision was reached following bilateral talks between Indian and Pakistani generals.
Mr Trump has also offered to broker peace in the Himalayan region of Kashmir, an offer that has similarly rankled in India. India and Pakistan have been locked in a dispute over Kashmir since their independence from British colonial rule in 1947. They both claim the territory in full but control it only in part, and India has strongly resisted any third-party mediation in the matter.
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