US President, Donald Trump continues a similar focus in the second leg of his middle east trip. In Qatar, Trump touted multibillion dollar investments deals between the two countries, rivalling the ones announced in Saudi Arabia just two days prior.
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00:00U.S. President Donald Trump continues a similar focus in the second leg of his Middle East trip.
00:06In Qatar, Trump thwarted multi-billion dollar investment deals between the two countries
00:11rivaling the ones announced in Saudi Arabia just two days prior.
00:17Luqman Harris has more from Riyadh.
00:21Indeed, if the first leg of his Middle East visit to Saudi Arabia is anything to go by,
00:26what we saw on the first day in Saudi was that it was dominated by investment agreements,
00:32big numbers being floated around in terms of investments successfully courted by President Trump from Saudi Arabia,
00:39followed by a skew to more geopolitical focus issues on the second day.
00:44We are seeing a very similar pattern at the start of his second leg in Qatar.
00:49Almost right off the bat, Trump announced a slew of new investment deals from Qatar to the United States,
00:54the most notable one, being a $200 billion deal involving Qatar Airways and Boeing.
01:02Trump said that the National Airline has pledged to buy an unspecified number of Boeing aircrafts from the American company.
01:11Here's what he had to say.
01:12From Boeing, that's the largest order of jets in the history of Boeing.
01:17That's pretty good.
01:19And that's 140.
01:22Was that a 140 or 160?
01:24Yeah, but it's actually 200, including the 40, so it's over $200 billion.
01:32But 160 in terms of the jets, that's fantastic.
01:36So that's a record, Kelly.
01:38And congratulations to Boeing.
01:40Get those planes out there.
01:41And if we learn anything from the first leg in Saudi,
01:46is that any other advancements and numerous other issues, including geopolitical issues,
01:52is kick-started by the agreement of all these big, huge investment agreements.
01:57And we are expecting to see a similar pattern entering the second day of Trump's visit in Qatar,
02:04which will then see him leave for the UAE.
02:06Notably, in Saudi, we saw once all the ink has dried on the investment agreements,
02:13Trump announced that the U.S. would lift all economic sanctions on Syria,
02:17not just rejuvenating relations between those two countries, the U.S. and Syria,
02:23but opening a new chapter between the U.S. and also all the big power brokers in the Middle East.
02:30It gives them a chance for greatness.
02:34The sanctions were really crippling, very powerful.
02:37And I spoke to Mohammed and I spoke to our friend from Turkey, who we just spoke to also by phone now.
02:47But I felt very strongly that this would give them a chance.
02:51It's not going to be easy anyway, so it gives them a good, strong chance.
02:55And it was my honor to do so.
02:57So we will be dropping all of the sanctions on Syria, which I think really is going to be a good thing.
03:04And Syria has a lot of money, and a lot of money, and a lot of money, and a lot of money that we have to do so much in order for the U.S.
03:21And indeed a similar signal burst given by the Saudi Foreign Minister
03:43signaling that Trump's announcement on Syria
03:46is a testament to how once you got all the economic agreements aligned
03:51and you're on the same page, we can start to see bigger changes between the US strategies
03:57as well as the Middle Eastern strategies as a whole.
04:00Syria, he said, is a prime example where renewed relations and a renewed approach
04:05would open up more and bigger economic opportunities within the region.
04:12We certainly hope that other countries that still have sanctions in place
04:16take that signal and build upon it.
04:22The European Union, I know, is in discussions to decide what to do
04:26and I think the fact that the US has taken this move hopefully will encourage the EU
04:32also to consider lifting all sanctions.
04:35I want to say that the UK has also lifted sanctions and I want to really appreciate them doing so.
04:41So indeed, the uniqueness of Trump's visit to the Middle East that's happening now
04:47is that while other presidents in the past may have embarked on such trips
04:52with at least regional if not international focus priorities,
04:57Trump seems to be very much a domestic focus president as we've seen throughout the past few months.
05:02So it's very much America first Trump in the Middle East so far
05:06but America first funded by Gulf states.
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