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CNN International: Police Arrest Andrew Mountbatten-Windsor; Trump Addresses Reps From 50+ Nations at Board of Peace Meeting; Trump Speaks at First Board of Peace Meeting; Trump Launches Board of Peace with $5B Pledged for Gaza. Aired 9:15-10a ET

Aired February 19, 2026 - 09:15   ET

THIS IS A RUSH TRANSCRIPT. THIS COPY MAY NOT BE IN ITS FINAL FORM AND MAY BE UPDATED.

[09:15:00]

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BECKY ANDERSON, CNN HOST, CONNECT THE WORLD: Well, hello and welcome to Breaking News coverage here on CNN. I'm Becky Anderson in Abu Dhabi, where we are following stunning events in the United Kingdom, where Andrew Mountbatten-Windsor was arrested hours ago on suspicion of misconduct in public office.

Take a look at the scenes at two residences associated with the Former UK Prince. Police in unmarked cars outside the Sandringham Estate in Norfolk and the Royal Lodge in Windsor. Andrew had just recently moved to Sandringham from Windsor after he was stripped of his titles over his ties to convicted sex offender Jeffrey Epstein.

Well, Andrew spent a decade as UK Trade Envoy during that time, he allegedly passed confidential information to Epstein, according to documents released by the U.S. Department of Justice. Mountbatten- Windsor has previously denied any wrongdoing over his ties to the disgraced financier.

Well, it is difficult to overstate just how impactful this news is to the British Royal Family. In a statement, King Charles III said, and I quote, I have learned with the deepest concern the news about Andrew Mountbatten-Windsor and suspicion of misconduct in public office.

What now follows is the full, fair and proper process by which this issue is investigated in the appropriate manner and by the appropriate authorities. In this, as I have said before, they have our full and whole hearted support and co-operation. CNN's Salma Abdelaziz, following this breaking news story from London.

And Salma, a royal source telling CNN that Buckingham Palace was not given prior warning of Andrew Mountbatten-Windsor's Thursday arrest. What more do we know about how that arrest unfolded?

SALMA ABDELAZIZ, CNN CORRESPONDENT: We do have a bit of a timeline now that I do want to share with you. We understand, of course, today, Thursday morning, at about 08:00 a.m. local time police vehicles, some of them unmarked, showed up at Sandringham Estate. This is, as you said, where Former Prince Andrew was staying. He moved

there only earlier this month after he was kicked out of the Royal Lodge in Windsor because of this growing scandal, because of this controversy by his brother, King Charles. Now, of course, we understand now that Andrew Mountbatten-Windsor was around 08:00 a.m. local time arrested by the police in a search of his property.

He was staying there a search of his property called the wood farm. It's actually the estate is owned by King Charles.

[09:20:00]

But of course, his brother was staying there, that search began. There was also a search that began in Windsor at the Royal Lodge where he had been staying previously. So, we are quite literally talking about police searching the homes of members of the royal family as we speak, while a senior member of the royal family has, of course, been arrested on suspicion of misconduct while in public office. Now, what does that mean? What does that relate to?

Well, this relates to this investigation is looking into Former Prince Andrew's time as a trade representative in the UK between 2001 and 2011. Now, the latest trove of Epstein documents released by the Department of Justice show, or appear to show that Former Prince Andrew, in his role as a trade representative for this country, may have, the allegation is, may have passed confidential government information, including investment opportunities, to Jeffrey Epstein, huge, of course, this news is absolutely shocking for this country.

It's earth shattering for a royal family that right now is in crisis mode. They are, of course, trying to put their best foot forward. We've seen members of the royal household, including King Charles himself, carry out their public duty, carry out their public events today as normal.

But I can promise you, no one has stepped out of their home without hearing at least one person shout a question about what is taking place today, about the arrest of Andrew Mountbatten-Windsor. Now we've also received that statement from King Charles that you've read out the royal family is right now trying as much as it cannot just to demonstrate that it is willing to support and work with the police force and work with local officials in whatever they may need in this matter.

But also, to separate themselves from Former Prince Andrew. But how much can you separate yourself from a member of the royal family, from your own brother, your own uncle, and so you have to remember, at the heart of the firm is, of course, a family that is very interconnected.

He could not have been that far. He was quite literally sitting on his brother's estate, Sandringham Estate, of course, owned by King Charles. Now what is taking place? This has been several hours, of course, since his arrest. We can imagine at this point that he's at a police station.

We simply don't know where he is being held, but at this point, you would imagine that he is at a police station. When he gets to a police station, he will be treated the same as any other citizen in this country. And he will be held in a prison cell if he is not already being held in a prison cell until he is questioned and either released or formally charged.

And that is what we're waiting on right now, that key fork in the road. What happens next? Do the police formally charge Prince Andrew, Former Prince Andrew, rather and hold on to him, or are we looking at just questions and release? We just have to wait and see how the next few hours play out, Becky.

ANDERSON: And we have just shown an image of King Charles carrying on his duties today. I think, receiving the credential the Kenyan High Commissioner at St. James' Palace. So certainly, he and his wife, who has also attended an event, as I understand it today, trying to give some semblance of sort of normal duty today.

The Thames Valley Police said in that statement that you referenced, and I want to quote here as part of the investigation, we have today arrested a man in his 60s from Norfolk on suspicion of misconduct in public office, and are carrying out searches at addresses in Berkshire and Norfolk.

The man remains in police custody at this time. But they haven't named him. That would be sort of normal process for the UK police, but they seem to be treating this like any less high-profile arrest. They could have just gone to interview him, but they've actually arrested him.

Haven't charged him, as we understand it as of yet, and he could be released at any point within the next 24 hours. Of course, I do want to note the period of time that Prince Andrew, or the Former Prince Andrew, was the UK Trade Envoy, because, of course, this is very specifically an arrest on suspicion of misconduct in public office that was in the sort of 2000s between about 2000 to 2011.

During that time of course, the UK had a UK Labor Party formally led the prime minister was Tony Blair. Latterly, the prime minister of the country was Gordon Brown, who has today released a statement saying that he's submitted a five-page memorandum to relevant police forces regarding the Jeffrey Epstein files. He said, after Andrew Mountbatten-Windsor's arrest.

[09:25:00]

And he goes on to say this memorandum provides new and additional information to that which I submitted last week to the Met the London police force, Essex and Thames Valley Police forces, who, as we understand it, are all working together on this where I express my concern that we secure justice for trafficked girls and women.

His statement did not specify the nature of the evidence that he submitted or how it was related to Mountbatten-Windsor. We've been asking the question, why now? Why is it that this morning, Andrew Mountbatten-Windsor was arrested by police. It happens to be his 66th birthday, of course. Perhaps we don't know, but perhaps the fact that Gordon Brown, the

Former Prime Minister has submitted further documents over the past week or so and subsequent documents today, may have something to do with this of course, Salma.

ABDELAZIZ: That's all possible. We also understand, of course, that the anti-monarchy group republic submitted essentially, a legal complaint. It was written by lawyers with legal language, accusing Former Prince Andrew of misconduct. Look, you cannot imagine the volume of information that this police investigation is going to deal with.

When we're talking about just the latest trove of documents that was released by the DOJ. That's 3 million documents. You have to imagine that this is a course of events, as we mentioned, over the course of a decade he was trade secretary. So, these are events that could have taken place across multiple countries.

This is going to be an extremely complicated investigation, one that we may see members of the royal family having to answer questions to the police about and that's why what we're looking at right now is just chapter one. If King Charles wanted this to go away, if King Charles was hoping that by sending his brother out of Windsor and stripping him of his royal titles would quiet the scandal that has not happened.

And fundamentally, will the police ask the question to members of the royal household, what did you know? What did you not know? When did you know it? This is the beginning of an investigation. There are also demands in the United States. This is bigger than the UK.

There are also demands in the United States, of course, for him to testify in Congress. What was the trigger? What was the nugget that got the police to make this extraordinary move of arresting him this morning? We don't yet know, but what we do know, Becky, is that it is a nugget that they are going to investigate, which means this is only going to get bigger.

They're going to pull on those strands and find what else is behind them. So, for the royal family, this is the beginning of the crisis, one that they cannot control, one that is now a matter of police investigation. So, there's only so much they can say as well, and one that's going to drag out, you can imagine, depending on how long this investigation takes and whether or not he's formally charged.

ANDERSON: Salma, thank you. I want to bring in CNN Royal Historian Kate Williams at this point. And Kate, let's just underscore how unprecedented this event is. I mean, we've seen King Charles and Queen Camilla this morning holding their normally scheduled events, but this can be, or certainly feel like no normal day for those two.

How unprecedented is this? Now how do you think they will gear strategy from now on in?

KATE WILLIAMS, CNN ROYAL HISTORIAN: Becky, this is totally unprecedented. This is extraordinary. We haven't seen a senior royal arrested since the 17th century. That was Charles the first who was arrested by the parliamentarians, I mean, and then he was executed.

This is a serious moment. This is the royals in, I mean, utter crisis. It's the biggest crisis for the royal family since the death of Diana. And of course, you know the death of Diana, people did forgive the queen quite quickly for being there with the boys at Balmoral. This is something totally different.

Andrew has been arrested, been arrested on these extremely serious allegations of misconduct in public office, as you were just talking about there. The question is whether or not he's going to be charged, which he does have to be charged or not, quite soon, and then he will actually have to be charged with a crime under British law.

We've seen the Justice Secretary, David Lammy, saying, no one is above the law, and that is the point that's been making here, the royal family. Who lets I have to say, over the years, I'm a royal historian. I've studied the royal family for my job. Over the years, the royal family have escaped the law in many different ways here Andrew is not and this is unprecedented.

This is the Royals in crisis, and they really have to separate themselves from Andrew, which is what Charles was trying to do in that statement, over 100 words, and not a single word of my brother, he was trying to separate himself from Andrew.

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But the question is whether they'll be able to do that, and the strategy they'll have in place. You were just asking about that, Becky, is they'll carry on doing their duty. As Charles said in the statement, duty and service, that's what they'll carry on doing. But it is the question, is the duty of the efforts of the work of Charles and Camilla going to be swamped in the Andrew allegations? I'm afraid, I think that it will be.

ANDERSON: Keep calm and carry on is oft times a phrase that we associate with the royal family actually comes as I think I remember from being at school in the UK, from a motivational poster that was designed just before the Second World War, back in 1939.

WILLIAMS: That's right.

ANDERSON: As people were, you know, getting really sort of concerned about what was going on, they will want to keep calm and carry on. And when you see that image this morning of King Charles, he looks, you know, very royal and very sort of duty full.

They may face questions themselves, of course, about what they knew, and when? At this point, is it clear that anybody else in the royal family will be questioned?

WILLIAMS: That's it. King Charles has said he'll support all the investigations. Just recently, the royal family, also said they would support any investigation, which I think, really, to me, accelerated the Thames Valley Police investigation into what Andrew did. We believe it's what Andrew did as trade envoy, just as you were saying they're the allegations, he passed on confidential information about British companies which would qualify as insider dealing.

So that's a crime under British law. What did the king know? So, they all knew he was being trade envoy. They all knew he was going all over the world. And Epstein, of course, was invited to royal palaces. He was invited to royal occasions. We know he and Ghislaine came up for shooting weekends and royal birthdays.

And you know, how much did the king did or didn't know. And we certainly know now this is not an allegation relating at all to Ms. Giuffre and Ms. Giuffre family have put out a statement today about how it is important for the survivors, but this isn't the allegations don't relate to Andrew and the relate the questions of traffic women, which Gordon Brown, as you mentioned earlier.

Gordon Brown, has put through this dossier, he said, we must put the victims first. This isn't about trafficked women, but we do know that in 2022 Ms. Giuffre said she was told as a legal precedent, a legal contract was made with her not to speak about what her allegations against Andrew during the Queen's Jubilee Year, the Queen passed in 2022.

And it's clear that legal contract must, I presume, this is what I believe must have been kept in place, because Ms. Giuffre did not speak again about any of her allegations during the accession of the king. So, we might argue there that the king knew about this contract with Virginia not to speak out and kept it up.

I mean, certainly that's the question. So, we don't know what they did or what they didn't know. But we saw Camilla was out on out and about this morning, doing engagements, and people were shouting. What do you know? We saw Charles being heckled earlier this year.

What do you know about your brother? And I think, simply the fact is, the royal family, they're a family and they're an institution. This is Charles, his brother. People are going to say you knew him. You went to parties with him. You went to engagements with him. You must have known something.

And Charles is going to have to separate himself, very, very you know, with absolute clarity.

ANDERSON: Yeah. Right, Kate, it's good to have you. Thank you very much indeed. As we continue our Breaking News coverage of the Former Prince Andrew's arrest. We are also keeping an eye on that Board of Peace event, the first full meeting of the President Trump hosted Board of Peace.

That is this hour. That is the group that are in attendance. We are waiting on a speech from the U.S. President, stand by.

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ANDERSON: Let's get you straight to Washington, where President Trump is hosting the first meeting of his Board of Peace at the U.S. Institute for Peace now branded in his own name. Let's listen in.

DONALD TRUMP, PRESIDENT OF THE UNITED STATES OF AMERICA: -- the Board of Peace, and it's all about an easy word to say, but a hard word to produce peace, but we're going to produce it. We've been doing a really good job, and some of these leaders that are with us have helped me very much during just this first year, we have a first year like probably no other ever in our country, because we settled eight wars, and I think a night to come, it turned out to be a tougher one.

I thought that was going to be the easiest one. But with war, you never know what's easy and what's not so easy. But we've had a great relationship, and I've become friendly with so many of the people, and I appreciate you being here. These are great people. These are great leaders.

And the people that are watching by closed circuit and open circuit, in many cases, they're so proud of it. They want it to be open, but they become incredible friends of mine. And, you know, we rebuilt our country in my first term, and now we're at a point that the United States has never seen before.

We broke 50,000 on the DOW, they said that would take four years. We broke 7000 on the S&P, they said you couldn't do that within four years. It would be impossible. And when I came in, they were all saying, if he could get to anywhere close to 40, 45,000 it would be amazing achievement over four years.

Well, we hit 50,000 in the first year, and we hit 7000 which was actually tougher to do, according to the Wall Street geniuses. We hit 7000 in the first year. They said it could take four or five years. They'd be very happy. It would have been a great job. We did it in one but we're doing a great job.

Board of Peace is one of the most important and consequential things, I think, that I'll be involved in. We've been involved in a lot, and really, I've been involved in a lot with the people up here. We work together on ending wars with their country. Some of the wars were 32 years long.

32, 34 and a 37 that's a long time. And we ended it in about two days each one of those. But we have some other work to do, and we're getting it done. Gaza is very complex. It's been amazing. I want to thank Steve and Jared for an amazing job. Marco is over there watching, everybody's fantastic and JD, what a job.

They're all doing. It's a team. I think it's the best team ever assembled. And you see that by the results. So today is a tremendous honor to welcome you all to the United States Institute of Peace for the inaugural meeting of the Board of Peace. Very important. I believe it's the most consequential board, certainly in terms of power and in terms of prestige, there's never been anything close, because these are the greatest world leaders.

Almost everybody's accepted. And the ones that haven't will be. Some are playing a little cute. Doesn't work. You can't play cute with me, but they're playing a little bit, but they're all joining everybody, most of them very immediately, a few that we really don't want because they're trouble.

Take care of them. But this is the most prestigious board ever put together. You know, I've seen some great corporate boards. I've seen some great boards, period. Its peanuts compared to this board because we have virtually everyone is the head of a country other than Johnny, but he's the head of soccer.

So that's not so bad, right? Johnny, I like your job the best, I think. And by the way, your World Cup has set every single ticket record in the history of soccer and the history nobody has ever seen anything like it. The sales are virtually complete. Nobody has ever seen anything. So, congratulations. You made a good decision.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: We did it together.

TRUMP: We did it together. Thank you, Johnny, great guy. So, I want to thank the many leaders and dignitaries who have traveled great distances and lengths for the important gathering that we're.

[09:40:00]

At right now, this building was built for peace, and nobody knew what to name it. And then Marco named it after me. I had nothing to do with it, I swear I didn't. I swear I had no idea. They said there's a surprise coming. I didn't know that surprise. I thought they were going to give me a lot of money or something.

Maybe cash. Can always use some extra cash. But I came and they stopped the beautiful beast. I got out very safely, I'm sure, and looked up, and there it said Donald J. Trump on the building. And when I say that that was had nothing to do, nobody believes it, and that's OK, but I appreciated it.

That was Marco and JD and a group got together and they did that, and I just thought it was very nice, and it makes me work harder. We're going to have to work harder. We're going to have to make this building much more important. They built this brand new, they built it for peace, but nobody occupied it.

You know, nobody knew what the purpose of it, but the architecture is so beautiful. And it was with the meeting rooms, the reception rooms, it's really amazing. Who would think that it was built without anybody in mind or anything in mind. And then the State Department took it over.

They liked it. Marco came over one day he saw this. He said, this building is great. And he actually claimed it, right? He claimed it. And that's what he does. Where is Marco? Is that true? You claimed this building. You took it away from about five groups that wanted it.

That was done very quickly, very methodically, but it was really, really built so beautifully and such a beautiful building, but we worked together to ensure the brighter future for the people of Gaza, the Middle East and the entire world. I think that the Board of Peace because it's mostly leaders and unbelievably respected people. But mostly leaders of Middle Eastern countries, countries from all

over the world, and they've been very generous with money also. And the United States, which I'll say in a moment, is also very generous with money, because there's nothing more important than peace, and there's nothing less expensive than peace.

You know, when you go to wars, it costs you 100 times what it costs to make peace. We have a man at the end right there that's smiling because you learned that after 30 years of fighting, right? 30 years of fighting, we got it done. I want to thank you very much. It was the great thing you did.

You and your new friend, they came to my office and they said, I've been fighting for 22 years now. You're there for 23 years, right? But I've been fighting for 22 years. That's all I've done is fight this gentleman. And his counterpart was there for seven years. He said, I've been there for seven years, all I've done is fight this gentleman.

And we had it worked out in about 24 hours, right? And it's been a good piece of that. I think they've become friends. I'm not sure I'm allowed to say that, but I think so. I think they've become friends, right -- Stand up. Stand up. These are two tough cookies, too. You think that was easy.

It wasn't easy. These are two tough people, good people, but tough people. But, you know, we're in the Oval Office, and we were getting near, but the one was at one side of the room. I have two chairs right in front of the desk, the beautiful resolute desk. One's over here, one's on the other side of the room.

I said, boys, could you get a little closer? They felt very uncomfortable. You know, they've been killing each other for 32 years. So, I say, can you get a little closer? After one hour, they were right next to each other. We made a deal. They hugged, they signed, and we had peace with two very important countries, and I'll never forget it.

So, they started off a little weak, and they ended up really strong, and you can be very proud of yourselves. It was a beautiful thing to see. Thank you. Look at that? Do you believe it? 32 years? Thank you. Thank you very much. But we're honored to be joined today by Prime Minister Rama of Albania, president -- where is President Milei?

Another one, I'll tell you. Where is President Milei? I endorse him. I'm not supposed to be endorsing people, but I endorse when I like people. You know, I've had a very good record of endorsing candidates within the United States, but now I endorse foreign leaders, including Viktor Orban, who's here, and others.

And I endorse this gentleman, Milei. He was a little behind in the polls. He ended up winning in a landslide. I just endorsed the Prime Minister of Japan. She was in a tight race, but was probably going to win.

[09:45:00] And she wanted the largest number in the history of Japan. So, she

likes me a lot, but it was an honor. And you doing, oh, look, they're sitting right next Viktor, I think, but ultimately, I think I'm going to end up endorsing. Hey, look, as long as it works, it's OK with me.

But the endorsement seems to be working in foreign countries too. So that's good, but nice to have you both, Viktor, nice to have you both very proud of you. The prime minister of another really, just a great guy, Pashinyan of Armenia, President Aliyev of Azerbaijan.

I love saying that name. Now, you know, at the beginning, it was giving me a hard time. Now, I love saying it. It's a beautiful name. I love it. His Majesty, King Hamad bin Isa Al Khalifa of Bahrain. Thank you. Thank you. Where are you? Where are you? He's so rich he can sit there.

He can sit wherever the hell he wants. You know, he could sit up in the corner. He could sit up top. He might take a piece of this building -- take 25 percent of the building for about 6 billion. Thank you, and you've been very generous also. We appreciate it.

Prime Minister Hun Manet of Cambodia, raise your hand wherever you may be, because, yeah, hi. How are you? Congratulations. That was another one, right? We did a good job with that one. Prime Minister Madbouly of Egypt. Thank you very much, and say hello to the general slash, president, OK.

Prime Minister Orban of Hungary, who has my complete and total endorsement for election. Not everybody in Europe loves that endorsement, but that's OK. He does an unbelievable job. He's done an incredible job on immigration, unlike some countries that have hurt themselves, but they're working on it.

But I just want to let you know you have my total and complete endorsement, and I'm putting it out. I already did, but I'm putting it out again, and you're coming up with an election, and I think you should be good. I'll tell you, Milei did pretty well. He was a little down right, and then he was he ended up winning in a landslide.

So that's pretty good. You're going to do great Viktor. Thank you very much for being here. Appreciate it. You run a great country. A man that I really like a lot is he's definitely tough. I don't want to fight him. President Prabowo of Indonesia. Thank you very much, please. This is a big guy, I tell you.

I said, how many people in Indonesia? He said, like 240 million. I said, no, no, say it again. How many? It's a big country you have, and you do a great job and respected by everybody. And thank you very much for being here. Thank you very much, Mr. President. President Tokayev of Kazakhstan. Thank you very much.

What a country that is. It's a wonderful country and a rich country. In case anybody has any question, we have some very rich people here today. President Osmani of Kosovo. President, thank you very much. Great, great job you're doing too. Thank you very much. Prime Minister, Sharif. I like this man of Pakistan because there was some fighting going on

when I got to know him and your Field Marshal, General, great, great general, great Field Marshal, a great guy. And I got to meet the prime minister, and he said, in front of our Chief of Staff, Susie Wiles, who's right here.

He said, you know, nobody knows is, but I believe that President Trump saved 25 million lives when he says, when he stopped the war between us and India, right? He's, you made that statement. I said 25 million lives could have been much more actually, but it was really a beautiful thing.

You said that in front of a group of people, that was they walked out. They don't think about it, but you're talking about that kind of lives, that war was raging, planes were being shot down, right? And it was Pakistan and India. And I got on the phone with both of them, and I knew them a little bit.

I knew Prime Minister Modi very well. Actually, I got to know Pakistan through a little trade. They were trying to make too good a deal, and I got a little upset with them. And in the end, they got what they wanted, right? And they made a good deal. And I got to like them, the Prime Minister, the Field Marshal, who's a tough man, a tough good fighter, right?

[09:50:00]

Good, serious fighter. I like good fighters, actually. And when I heard that they were fighting, I picked up a certain newspaper. I won't tell you which one, because it's fake news generally, but I picked up this newspaper, and I saw that Pakistan and India were really going at it.

And then it got worse and worse, and planes were -- many planes were shot down. It was all out. And I called them. I said, Listen, I'm not doing trade deals with you two guys, if you don't settle this up. They said, no, no, no, that has both of them. They didn't want to do that.

I said, no, it has to. If you don't do it, I'm not doing a trade deal. We're not doing a trade deal. And they do a lot of business with the United States, and they sort of softened up all of a sudden. And all of a sudden, I read where there was a little bit of a pull back by one and the other.

And all of a sudden, we worked out a deal, right? But I said, if you fight, I'm going to put 200 percent tariffs on each of your countries, which essentially makes you not allowed, you know, you can't do any business. One of them, I won't say which one said, no, can't do that.

They both wanted to fight. But when it came to money, not like money, when it came to losing a lot of money, they said, I guess we don't want to fight. And we solved that deal in two, three days, right? And we did. We said these are two very powerful -- two nuclear nations.

And I don't want to say what was going to happen, but, you know, bad things happen. So prime minister, I want to thank you, because that was a big that was a very big deal. People have no idea. A lot of them say, oh, well, they weren't fighting. They were fighting.

11 jets were shot down, very expensive jets, and they were all in. Both of them were all in, and now they're not. And I think we'll always be able to settle up with them. I really do. I think you're going to have, you know, it's a lot of progress was made, even in the relationship.

And Prime Minister Modi also is a great man. He's a great guy. They're all great but I was very proud of it. President Pena of Paraguay is here, President. President, thank you very much. Young handsome guy. It's always nice to be young and handsome doesn't mean we have to like you.

I don't like young handsome men, women -- like. Men, no, how to have any interest. Good. That's right. That's right. Thank you very much. You're doing a great job, too. His Excellency, Prime Minister Al Thani of Qatar. Just a great man, please, a great man and highly respected, and he's working with a man who is amazing.

I always say he needs a public relations agency, because you do so much good, and they have you down as evil, and you're not evil. You help us so much, and you're such a good ally. And I just want people to know that. And the Amir is incredible smart, smart as you can be a great leader, and he cares so much for the people, and he cares so much for the Middle East.

So, I want to thank you very much. And send my regards to your country has been a great help, you know, surprising to some of the people writing out there, but now they'll start changing their tune, because it's true. I only tell the truth. Prime Minister Dan of Romania, wonderful people, the Romanian people are fantastic.

Fantastic people like you're fantastic. And a lot of them come and work in this country and help us in this country, as you know, and it's -- they are just really solid people. President Mirziyoyev of Uzbekistan, who is, where, there he is, and a friend of mine got one of the most difficult names in history.

But that's OK. It doesn't matter. Your country is doing great. You're doing great. And just no problems, every time I see him, nope, we're doing good, no problems. And General Secretary to Lam of Vietnam. Vietnam is incredible as a country and as a force. It's an honor to have you.

Really great honor to have you. A lot of respect, a lot of respect for your country. We also want to express my gratitude to Vice President JD Vance, who is a fantastic man. He's a fantastic talent. He was a great student. They went to one school. They graduated. You know, most people, if you watch some of the people that were at the event in Munich, they didn't graduate quickly from college.

They had everything they could do. There was one young, attractive woman, she was unable to answer questions, and she didn't do so well like JD did in college.

[09:55:00] JD graduated in a 4.5-year college in two years, and then he went to

Yale, and he graduated at the top of his class, went to the military grade. But when he went to Yale, there was one person that was marginally ahead of him, so he married her. Can you believe it? He married the person that was ahead.

I don't know. I always like to say JD was first and Usha was second, because I get a little uncomfortable when I say though, but he's been incredible. He's a brilliant guy and a great guy, and he's been my friend. All of our people, we have a fantastic group of people, our cabinet members, everybody, many of them here, but JD, has been great.

Thank you very much. He gets a little bit tough on occasion. We've got to slow him down just a little bit on occasion, he says his mind now, then we have the opposite extreme. We have your friend sitting in the back. Your good your best friend sitting in the back is Marco.

Marco does it with a velvet love, but it's a kill, right? The result is the same. They do it very differently. And Marco, you really did yourself proud two days ago in Munich, in fact, so proud that I almost terminated his employee because they were saying, why can't Trump do this?

I do, but I say it differently, but Marco, don't do any better than you did, please, because if you do, you're out of here. But no, he got it was, I want my guys to do great. And the claim he's gotten, and the claim JD gets is great. We have smart people, and when you see the representatives there, like Gavin Newsom, he didn't know what he was doing.

They didn't even know why he didn't know why he was there. Or AOC, she was unable to answer a simple question. And she could have said, well, I'm studying it, and I'll report back to you next week. You know, you can get away with that, but she just went, it's actually, I think it could be a career ending answer, because for 25 years, anybody running against her, I think Susie is going to use that little --

ANDERSON: Well, Donald Trump convening his first Board of Peace, initially launched as part of Donald Trump's 20-point peace plan for Gaza. Since then, the remit has somewhat morphed beyond just Gaza or the Middle East, and as some 26 or 27 founding members in his opening speech.

He said that the Board of Peace will be one of the most important and consequential things that he will ever be involved in, certainly in terms of power and prestige, he said. Almost everyone is signed up, he said. A few are playing cute with me by not joining, but they will join, he said.

This meeting of the Board of Peace coming as it does, as the prospect of a U.S. attack on Iran is still very real. Well, he continues to thank those who are in attendance. So, let's bring in my colleague, Paula Hancocks, just to talk about Paula, what we understand to be the point of this meeting today, this gathering.

Certainly, we've heard that there will be pledges of support for Gaza when it comes to governance, security, humanitarian, reconstruction, there is still very little detail on Gaza.

PAULA HANCOCKS, CNN CORRESPONDENT: Exactly, Becky. This is what we're hoping to hear today. It is the inaugural meeting, so presumably they're not going to delve too deep into these details, but we're hoping to hear more about how this phase one becomes phase two?

How this Board of Peace interacts with what is the Palestinian Technocratic Committee, which is supposed to eventually run Gaza? And then, of course, this stabilization force, which will be boots on the ground from a number of different countries in Gaza itself.

So, we're hoping to hear more details about how they will interact exactly when they will start to be created. We have heard, for example, when it comes to the stabilization force, Indonesia has pledged at least 1000 troops. But of course, no one is going to go into Gaza until you have that demilitarization of Hamas.

ANDERSON: Yeah.

HANCOCKS: So, we're hoping to hear more on exactly how that will happen as well.

ANDERSON: And I spoke to the sort of director general, as it were, of the Board of Peace, Nikolai Mladenoff, who is there, sort of charged with kind of getting the kind of vision into somewhat of a plan, he has said that time is of the essence. There is no plan B. This is as good as it gets, so we've got to get on with it.

HANCOCKS: Absolutely. And the fact is, Israel has been very clear that if this doesn't work, and if Hamas doesn't disarm, then the war will start again.

ANDERSON: Yeah.

HANCOCKS: So those -- that's how high the stakes are.

ANDERSON: The window is very tight here. It's good to have you. That's it for this hour. CNN, back after this short break. Stay with us.

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