FOREIGN POLICY/MALAYSIA/TRUMP AS PRESIDENT: “When President Trump welcomed Malaysia’s prime minister, Najib Razak, to the White House on Tuesday [9-12-17], he thanked him for ‘all the investment you’ve made in the United States.’
Mr. Trump did not single out Mr. Najib’s patronage of his hotel two blocks from the White House, but he could have: the Malaysian leader was spotted entering and exiting the Trump International Hotel, with his entourage, on Monday and Tuesday…
Whatever the motivation, the choice of lodgings added to the awkwardness of a meeting already replete with ethical questions. Mr. Najib is under investigation by the Justice Department, part of a corruption scandal that critics said he has fended off by firing investigators and dismissing negative news reports about him as ‘fake news.’
In these respects, he is not unlike Mr. Trump. So it was perhaps not a surprise that the two leaders skipped a news conference, kept their public remarks brief, and stayed on the safe ground of trade and counterterrorism…
Relations between the two countries ruptured after Malaysia accused the North Korean government of assassinating Kim Jong-nam, the half brother of Kim Jong-un, in a bizarre attack at Kuala Lumpur’s international airport. Each country temporarily barred the other’s nationals from leaving.”
-Mark Landler, “Trump Welcomes Najib Razak, the Malaysian Leader, as President, and Owner of a Fine Hotel,” The New York Times online, Sept. 12, 2017