President Trump told reporters the peace talks with the Taliban are “dead” in the aftermath of a U.S. soldier being killed in Afghanistan last week.
Trump was set to host a Taliban delegation at Camp David for a continuation of peace talks just days before the anniversary of 9/11. He canceled them after Sgt. 1st Class Elis Barreto Ortiz, 34, was killed with a car bomb.
“They’re dead,” Trump said of the talks Monday. “They’re dead, as far as I’m concerned. They thought they had to kill people to put themselves in a better negotiating position. When they did that, they killed 12 people. One happened to be a great American soldier. A wonderful young man, from Puerto Rico. Family is from Puerto Rico. You can’t do that with me. So they’re dead, as far as I’m concerned.”
Echoing Secretary of State Mike Pompeo, Trump said the U.S. has been heavily targeting the terror group in recent days.
“We had a meeting scheduled. It was my idea and it was my idea to terminate it. I didn’t discuss it with anybody else. When I heard, very simply, that they killed one of our soldiers and 12 other innocent people, I said there’s no way I’m meeting on that basis. There’s no way I’m meeting. They did a mistake,” he added.
Regarding why he would consider hosting members of the Taliban at Camp David, Trump said it was either that or in the White House, and the press “wouldn’t have been happy with that either.”
Barreto Ortiz, who was from Puerto Rico, served as a maintenance control sergeant and was attached to the 82nd Brigade Support Battalion, 3rd Brigade Combat Team, 82nd Airborne Division based out of Fort Bragg, North Carolina. He is the 16th U.S. service member to be killed in Afghanistan for 2019.
The car bomb was denoted at a checkpoint near NATO headquarters and the United States embassy in Kabul. A Romanian soldier was also killed in the attack.
[Read more: Pence hits back at NBC report on canceled Taliban meeting]
