United States President Donald Trump has called for an investigation into what he described as “triple sabotage” during his visit to the United Nations headquarters in New York this week.
In a social media post on Wednesday, Trump said he had written to UN Secretary-General Antonio Guterres demanding a probe into three separate incidents involving a stalled escalator, a malfunctioning teleprompter, and audio problems during his speech to the General Assembly on Tuesday.
Just moments before his address, Trump and First Lady Melania Trump were forced to walk up an escalator after it abruptly stopped. At the time, Trump appeared to downplay the incident, joking about the escalator and a “bad” teleprompter during his remarks.
However, his tone shifted sharply the following day, when he labeled the episodes “three very sinister events” and revealed that the US Secret Service was involved in the matter.
“It’s amazing that Melania and I didn’t fall forward onto the sharp edges of these steel steps, face first. It was only that we were each holding the handrail tightly or, it would have been a disaster,” Trump wrote, calling the incident “absolutely sabotage” and citing a Sunday Times report alleging that UN staff had previously joked about turning off escalators to embarrass him.
“The people that did it should be arrested!” he added.
Trump also claimed that the sound system was “completely off” during his speech, saying that attendees “couldn’t hear a thing” unless they used interpreters’ earpieces.
US Ambassador to the UN Mike Waltz echoed Trump’s concerns, calling the incidents “unacceptable” and saying they reflected “serious safety and security risks.”
The UN has not issued a response to Trump’s latest accusations. On Tuesday, UN spokesperson Stephane Dujarric suggested that a member of Trump’s delegation may have accidentally triggered the escalator’s emergency stop button. Another UN official, Farhan Aziz Haq, said the teleprompter was the responsibility of Trump’s team and referred questions to the White House.
Source: Al Jazeera
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