Trump gets rough ride in EU, NATO talks
US PRESIDENT Donald Trump yesterday ran into the first problems of a landmark European trip, embarrassingly called out in public over Russia and on leaks into the Manchester terror attack.
His carefully choreographed visits to the EU and NATO in Brussels were designed to heal divisions caused by the billionaire’s harsh campaign criticisms of both institutions.
Trump was to take a “tough” stance with NATO – the US-led military alliance he once dubbed “obsolete” – to push it to take more action on Islamist terrorism and to pay its way. But differences emerged after his talks with the European Union’s top officials Donald Tusk and Jean-Claude Juncker on climate change, trade, and above all Russia.
“I’m not 100 percent sure that we can say today – ‘we’ means Mr President and myself – that we have a common position, common opinion about Russia,” Tusk said.
Trump on the campaign trail made restoring relations with Russia a key promise but he has faced bitter opposi- tion in Washington and has since become embroiled in a scandal over alleged links to Moscow. He had also previously alarmed the EU by backing Britain’s Brexit vote last year and by calling the bloc a vehicle for German domination of the Continent.
After the meeting of what has been dubbed the “Two Donalds”, EU leader Tusk said the EU and US “agreed on many areas, first and foremost on counterterrorism”. But in a combative line, Tusk also called for “Western values” to be promoted, challenging former tycoon Trump’s world view that self-interested deals best settle global problems.
Britain’s Prime Minister Theresa May said she would raise directly with Trump the issue of leaks from a probe into the Manchester terror attack that have left British authorities infuriated.
Trump has made enlisting NATO in the US-led coalition fighting Islamic State a key objective of the summit, saying the Manchester killings showed how dangerous the threat was and that there was no option but to defeat the jihadists completely. NATO Chief Jens Stoltenberg said the alliance would formally endorse joining the coalition at the summit, despite reservations in France and Germany about getting involved.
“This will send a strong political message of NATO’s commitment to the fight against terrorism,” Stoltenberg said, stressing that it would not involve the alliance in a combat role. Stoltenberg said the allies would also meet Tusk’s demands to share more of the security burden and reaffirm a commitment to spend 2 percent of GDP on defence.
Trump’s entourage warned the billionaire president would push allies heavily on the 2 percent GDP spend on defence, which was agreed in 2014.