By Lili Bayer and Andrew Gray<\/p>\n
ANKARA, July 8 (Reuters) – NATO\u2019s European leaders aim to convince Donald Trump on Wednesday to re-commit to the military alliance at a summit in Ankara after the U.S. president revived his disputes with them over the Iran war and Greenland.<\/p>\n
Following his arrival in the \u200cTurkish capital on Tuesday, Trump said he might have boycotted the summit had it not been for his \u200cfriendship with the host, President Tayyip Erdogan, and he did not rule out further troop withdrawals from Europe.<\/p>\n
Earlier in the day, NATO sought to demonstrate that its European members were heeding Trump\u2019s \u200bcalls to spend more on their own defence and rely less on the U.S. by unveiling a raft of arms deals worth at least $50 billion.<\/p>\n
Trump, who has harshly criticised NATO during both his first and second terms in office, said he was \u201cvery disappointed\u201d with the alliance and that the U.S. was not \u201ctreated well” during the U.S.-Israeli war on Iran.<\/p>\n
\u201cWhy are we spending hundreds of billions of dollars, and they’re not there for us? We’ve always been there \u200cfor them,\u201d Trump said in an appearance on \u2060Tuesday alongside Erdogan.<\/p>\n
Trump has accused European nations of failing to let U.S. forces use their airspace and bases on their territories during the war.<\/p>\n
European officials have said they largely honoured their commitments to U.S. forces, despite not having \u2060been consulted about a conflict that roiled their economies and was deeply unpopular in Europe.<\/p>\n
TRUMP TARGETS FORMER ALLY MELONI WITH CRITICISM<\/p>\n
In recent weeks, Trump has singled out Italian Prime Minister Giorgia Meloni \u2013 formerly a close ally – for criticism.<\/p>\n
On Tuesday, Trump said his relationship with Meloni “became a \u200blittle \u200bbad because she refused to help us” with Iran while also \u200bdescribing her as a “nice person”.<\/p>\n
Italian officials have sought in \u200crecent days to draw a line under the spat.<\/p>\n
Trump also said Greenland, a semi-autonomous territory of NATO member Denmark, should be controlled by the United States.<\/p>\n
Hours later, also speaking in Ankara, Danish Prime Minister Mette Frederiksen said she expected allies to respect the sovereignty of the Danish kingdom and accept that Greenland was not for sale.<\/p>\n
SUMMIT DECLARATION AFFIRMS COMMITMENT TO COLLECTIVE DEFENCE<\/p>\n
The 32 NATO leaders met for a dinner on Tuesday evening but the main session of their summit takes place on Wednesday.<\/p>\n
Ambassadors from \u200call NATO members have approved a summit declaration that affirms an \u201cironclad commitment\u201d to \u200bcollective defence. But the declaration will only be issued after it has \u200bbeen endorsed by the leaders.<\/p>\n
The Trump administration has pressed \u200bEuropeans to boost defence spending and take on primary responsibility for the conventional defence of Europe as it seeks to shift its military focus to the \u200cIndo-Pacific.<\/p>\n
The U.S. has also announced troop withdrawals from \u200bEurope, cut the forces it assigns \u200bto NATO\u2019s defence plans \u2013 including an aircraft carrier, refuelling aircraft, fighter jets and drones – and launched a six-month review of its military presence on the continent.<\/p>\n
European leaders say they are working to take on more responsibility for the continent\u2019s security but want a predictable \u200band orderly transition to avoid any gaps \u200cin their defences that could be exploited by Russia.<\/p>\n
European officials have said they hope Trump\u2019s regard for Erdogan \u200band his good relationship with NATO Secretary General Mark Rutte would help smooth over tensions at the \u200bsummit.<\/p>\n
(Writing by Lili Bayer and Andrew Gray; Editing by Alistair Bell)<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"By Lili Bayer and Andrew Gray ANKARA, July 8 (Reuters) – NATO\u2019s European leaders aim to convince Donald…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":6994,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[3],"tags":[543,4224,57,2910,1130,534,156,7,2468,2579],"class_list":["post-6993","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-news","tag-ankara","tag-danish-prime-minister-mette-frederiksen","tag-donald-trump","tag-european-leaders","tag-giorgia-meloni","tag-greenland","tag-iran","tag-nato","tag-nato-member","tag-tayyip-erdogan"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/nato\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/6993","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/nato\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/nato\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/nato\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/nato\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=6993"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/nato\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/6993\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/nato\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/6994"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/nato\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=6993"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/nato\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=6993"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/nato\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=6993"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}