Donald Trump And Angela Merkel Discuss Key Talks In Washington
MEP: US President Donald Trump has welcomed German Chancellor Angela Merkel in the White House for the first face-to-face meeting between two leaders known for holding opposing views on a host of issues.
The pair held an awkward meeting that could help determine the future of the transatlantic alliance and shape the working relationship between two of the world’s most powerful leaders.
The meeting in Washington was discussed over a range of issues from the alliance of the North Atlantic Treaty Organization (NATO) and the crisis in Ukraine to the European policies regarding immigration and refugees.
Trump has meanwhile stood by claims he was wiretapped under Barack Obama, telling visiting German Chancellor Angela Merkel: “At least we have something in common, perhaps.”
US intelligence agencies under Mr Obama reportedly monitored Mrs Merkel’s phone, sparking an angry response.
After Trump suggested they shared the experience of being covertly monitored by the previous government, the German chancellor couldn’t hide her surprise, narrowing her eyes and wincing before staring at the president with barely disguised astonishment.
Reports of the Obama administration’s spying activities on its allies infuriated Merkel and Germany at the time and risked damaging the US relationship with one of its most important European partners.
“I reiterated to Chancellor Merkel my strong support for NATO as well as the need for our NATO allies to pay their fair share for the cost of defense,” Trump told a joint press conference after the meeting. “Many nations owe vast sums of money from past years and it is very unfair to the United States. These nations must pay what they owe.”
The US president thanked Merkel “for the German government’s commitment to increase defense spending and work toward contributing at least 2 percent of GDP” to the NATO alliance.
Trump also said that the US would respect “historic institutions” in what may have been a reference to the European Union, which has always been seen by the US as a bulwark of Western security, but about which senior figures in Trump’s government have expressed skepticism.
But the President also said that the US would “recognize the right of free people to manage their own destiny,” an apparent reference to the British vote in a referendum to leave the European Union last year, which dismayed Merkel and drew an endorsement from Trump.
The German leader made a point to say that her nation’s success relied on “European unity and European integration.”
“That’s something of which I am deeply convinced, and I am not only saying this back home, I am saying this here, I am saying it in the United States, also here in Washington in my talks with the President,” she said.
In her remarks, Merkel also referred to past tensions with Trump, as she seeks to build a new relationship with the third US president she has encountered as German chancellor.
“It’s always much better to talk to one another than about one another,” she said.
