US President Donald Trump called on Qatar to end the “funding of terrorism.”

“The nation of Qatar, unfortunately, has historically been a funder of terrorism at a very high level,” Trump said at a White House Rose Garden news conference, reported Voice of America.

He noted that Saudi Arabia and other nations had talked to him about confronting Qatar in the wake of his recent visit to Riyadh.

“We had a decision to make: do we take the easy road, or do we finally take a hard but necessary action? We have to stop the funding of terrorism,” said the US president. “I decided, along with [US] Secretary of State Rex Tillerson…the time had come to call on Qatar to end its funding…and its extremist ideology in terms of funding.”