Video: Donald Trump's India-Iran Gaffe While Praising His Tariff Policy

US President Donald Trump was defending his trade policy when he claimed that he used tariff threats to broker a truce between warring "Pakistan and Iran". Without realising his gaffe, the 79-year-old US leader went on to call Iran a 'nuclear-powered nation'-- confusing the Islamic republic with India.

Trump has repeatedly claimed that his tariff policy has helped him in stopping "five or six" of the "eight wars" in the first eight months of his second term in the White House. 

"Tariffs are a very important tool for our defence, for our national security. If we don't have tariffs, we're not going to have national security. As an example, if you look at Pakistan and Iran, I was in the midst of negotiating a trade deal with, actually, with Iran, and Pakistan was going to be in line. And because of tariffs, they all want to negotiate much differently, and we were making a good deal," Trump said.

Video: Donald Trump's India-Iran Gaffe While Praising His Tariff Policyhttps://t.co/0rncHGlWkJ pic.twitter.com/jWuBbvW6Uj

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"And then I heard that they're shooting at each other, and I said during one of my conversations, Are you guys going to go to war? Two nuclear powers. I said, Here's the deal. You go to war. I'm going to put a 200 per cent tariff. I'm going to stop you from doing any business in the United States. I said it to both of them. Within 24 hours, the war ended. That would have been a nuclear war," he added. 

He went on to claim that Pakistan's Prime Minister Shehbaz Sharif, who was in the US last month, complimented him for saving "millions of lives in front of a whole group of people, because he thought it was going to be war."

"But when it came to war or having to pay massive tariffs, the tariffs overrode. That's why it's so important. Not only the money, we're taking in trillions of dollars. Not only the money, the power to keep peace, the power to be used for good are enormous. But a lot of people didn't understand tariffs," he added. 

India Rejects Trump's Claims

Trump has repeatedly claimed that he brokered a ceasefire between nuclear-armed neighbours India and Pakistan. India, however, consistently maintained that there was no third-party involvement in its discussions with Pakistan over the truce and maintains that the ceasefire was achieved through direct talks between the Indian and Pakistani militaries and not US mediation.