No one needed to persuade us: Shashi Tharoor shuts down Trump's India-Pak claim

Congress leader Shashi Tharoor, who is leading an all-party Operation Sindoor delegation abroad, denied any involvement of a third party in the ceasefire understanding reached between India and Pakistan. Tharoor, who is currently in Brazil, made the remarks ahead of his delegation's visit to the United States.

Tharoor said India did not need any persuasion for a ceasefire as the country never wanted war.

"We have enormous respect for the American presidency, and we will speak with that respect in mind. But broadly speaking, our understanding is a bit different... No one needed to persuade us to stop. We had already said to stop," he said.

Tharoor said the Pakistani side must have needed some persuasion.

"If there was any persuasion by the American president or his senior officials, it would have been persuasion of the Pakistanis. They would have had to be persuaded. We don't need to be persuaded because we don't want war. We want to focus on development. That's the basic message," he added.

Further, Tharoor said that India never wanted to the conflict to escalate but had to react because Pakistan did.

He says, ".... We had consistently said from the very beginning on May 7th that we are not interested in prolonging the conflict. This is not the opening salvo in some sort of war. All it is is retribution against the terrorists, period. If Pakistan had not reacted, we would not have reacted..."