New York City Mayor Eric Adams has repeatedly mixed up India and Pakistan during a parade for his city’s Indian community, thanking a crowd of attendees wrapped in Indian flags for inviting him to “little Pakistan,” the PTI news agency reported.
Waving an Indian tricolor and standing beneath a poster reading ‘Mayor Adams Celebrates the Indian Community’, Adams praised the “Pakistani officers” of the New York Police Department, whom he said are “continuing to grow in their numbers and ranks,” according to Pakistan’s PTI news agency.
“So I thank you for allowing me to come here,” he continued. “I’ve known this community for so long, from little Pakistan in Queens, [to] little Pakistan in Brooklyn, you are a major foundation of our entire city. So let’s continue to celebrate your independence.”
According to PTI, someone in the crowd – many of whom were in Indian traditional dress – shouted “India,” “It’s India.”
Adams attended flag-raising ceremonies in Manhattan on Wednesday and Thursday, marking Pakistan and India’s respective independence days. At Wednesday’s event, he hoisted the Pakistani flag at Bowling Green park in the Financial District, before delivering the exact same “little Pakistan” remarks that he made to the Indian crowd on Saturday.
Adams called New York “the Islamabad of America” at Wednesday’s ceremony, and “the New Delhi of America” at Thursday’s event. The mayor has been mocked for using the same stock phrase in his speeches before, calling New York the Athens, Istanbul, Kiev, Seoul, Tel Aviv, and Mexico City “of America,” depending on the diaspora group being addressed.
British India was partitioned on August 14-15 1947, ending 300 years of colonial rule with the creation of two independent nations, India and Pakistan. The hastily prepared partition plan led to mass violence, up to two million deaths, and the displacement of some 15 million people. Today, both countries are armed with nuclear weapons and share a deep mistrust of one another, with unresolved territorial disputes leading to regular border clashes and military standoffs.