“It was a shame,” Trump said in the White House on Monday. (Archive photo)
Washington:
The degradation of the statue of Mahatma Gandhi here was a “shame,” said US President Donald Trump, a few days after it was vandalized by strangers with graffiti and spray paint during national protests against the murder of African-American George Floyd in detention.
The statue, which stands opposite the Indian Embassy, was vandalized on the night of June 2 and 3, prompting the Indian Embassy to file a complaint with local law enforcement agencies.
The incident occurred during the week of nationwide protests against the Floyd detention murder in Minneapolis on May 25.
“It was a shame,” Trump told the White House on Monday when asked about the incident.
The Indian embassy here has taken the matter up with the US State Department for an early investigation into the matter, as well as with the Metropolitan Police and the National Park Service.
He works with the US State Department, the Metropolitan Police and the National Park Service for the rapid restoration of the park statue.
US President and First Lady Melania Trump, during their visit to India in February, had spent considerable time at Gandhi’s ashram in Ahmedabad. Prime Minister Narendra Modi had personally shown them the historic site.
“The First Lady and I have just had the pleasure of visiting Mahatma Gandhi’s Ashram, a few kilometers from here, where he launched the famous Salt March,” said Trump during his speech at the Namaste rally. Trump at Motera Stadium. in Ahmedabad on February 24. A day later, Trump and the first lady also laid a wreath at Raj Ghat in New Delhi.
Photos of Trump and the first lady with the spinning wheel of Gandhi during their visit to the Sabarmati ashram in Ahmedabad are visible on the walls of the White House.
Last week, top U.S. lawmakers and the Trump campaign condemned the vandalism of the statue.
“Very disappointing,” tweeted Kimberly Guilfoyle, Donald J Trump advisor to President Inc. and national chair of Trump’s victory finance committees.
North Carolina senator Tom Tillis said: “It is shameful to see the degradation of the Gandhi statue” in Washington DC.
“Gandhi has been a pioneer of peaceful protests, demonstrating the great change it can bring. Riots, looting and vandalism do not bring us together,” he said.
Senator Marco Rubio said: “More evidence that violent radicals and mill madmen have diverted legitimate demonstrations to create anarchy or for their own ends”.
Protests against the murder of Floyd in custody have become violent in the United States and prestigious monuments have been damaged. Protesters in Washington DC burnt down a historic church and damaged landmarks like the Lincoln Memorial.
The American ambassador to India, Ken Juster, apologized for the incident.
“I am very sorry to see the desecration of the Gandhi statue in Wash, DC. Please accept our sincere apologies,” he said.
“As dismayed at the horrific death of George Floyd as by the horrific violence and vandalism. We are against prejudice and discrimination of all kinds. We will recover and be better,” he said in a tweet this week last.
One of the few statues of a foreign leader on federal territory in Washington DC, the Gandhi statue was dedicated by former Prime Minister Atal Bihari Vajpayee in the presence of former US President Bill Clinton on September 16, 2000, during his state visit to the United States.
