Zayn Malik and Gigi Hadid, who share 2-year-old daughter Khai, broke up in late 2021 amid experiences he’d gotten into an argument together with her mother Yolanda Hadid on the Pennsylvania house he shared with the mannequin. According to a police report obtained by E! News that 12 months, Zayn was accused of performing with “intent to harass, annoy or alarm” Gigi (who was not current) and Yolanda, whereas allegedly speaking “lewd, lascivious, threatening or obscene words.” At the time, Zayn denied the accusations and issued a press release, saying partially that he remained “vigilant” in defending their daughter by giving her “the privacy she deserves.”

Nearly two years later, the singer stands by his assertion.

“I knew what the situation was, I knew what happened and the people involved knew what happened too,” he informed Call Her Daddy host Alex Cooper. “And that’s all I really cared about. If anybody of the same mind would look at the situation, I believe that you could respect that I just didn’t want to bring attention to anything. I just wasn’t trying to get into a negative back and forth with her—any sort of narrative online where my daughter was going to look back and be able to read into it and it would just be something, there was no point.”

As Zayn defined, he believes he handled the state of affairs “in an amicable, respectful way.”

“And that’s all that needs to be said,” he continued. “I just I feel like it’s a lot of negativity.”