Merkel suggests US cannot be relied upon

German chancellor Angela Merkel has stood by her suggestion that Europe can no longer rely entirely on the US and declared that Germany and China can work together to help calm the world’s problems.

Mrs Merkel is hosting the G20 summit on Friday and Saturday in Hamburg. The gathering should make for a challenging combination of world leaders, with US president Donald Trump, Russian leader Vladimir Putin and Turkish president Recep Tayyip Erdogan attending, and major protests are expected.

Welcoming Chinese president Xi Jinping to Berlin, Mrs Merkel said their pre-summit meeting was “a good opportunity to expand and broaden our extensive strategic relations”.

“It is a great pleasure for us to welcome you here today at a time of turmoil in the world, when China and Germany can make a contribution to calming down this turmoil somewhat,” Mrs Merkel said.

The G20 summit comes amid unease in Europe about the Trump administration’s “America First” approach to trade and other issues. After her last encounter with Mr Trump in late May, Mrs Merkel said: “The times in which we can fully count on others are somewhat over, as I have experienced in the past few days.”

Asked in an interview with weekly Die Zeit whether she would repeat that comment, she replied: “Yes, exactly that way.

“It is, for example, open whether we can and should in the future rely on the US investing so much as it has so far in the United Nations’ work.”

Mrs Merkel also held a pre-summit meeting last week with the event’s European participants, who underscored their backing for the Paris accord to combat climate change. She reiterated that the Trump administration’s decision to withdraw from the Paris agreement was “extraordinarily regrettable”.