THE HAGUE — President Donald Trump should stop his trade war against America’s allies now that NATO members have agreed to hike defense spending, French President Emmanuel Macron urged on Wednesday.
“We cannot, among allies, say that we must spend more [on defense] … and wage a trade war,” Macron said at the end of a NATO summit in The Hague.
“That’s why it is very important to return to what should be the rule within a group of allies. That is to say: a true trade peace,” Macron told reporters. He added that he had made the point with other leaders and that it had been echoed by Italy’s Giorgia Meloni and Recep Tayyip Erdoğan of Turkey.
The North Atlantic alliance agreed on a new defense spending target of 5 percent of GDP at the June 24-25 summit — a figure Trump had demanded for months. With this commitment in place, NATO’s European members now hope Trump will scale back the tariffs he has imposed on the bloc.
But Trump didn’t appear immediately satisfied, chiding Spain for failing to commit to the 5 percent target.
Calling Madrid’s reluctance to agree to the target “terrible” Trump said the U.S. would make Spain pay “twice as much” in ongoing trade talks.
“If Spain doesn’t pay 5 percent they’ll pay back on trade,” he said. It remains unclear how the U.S. would achieve that, however, as Spain is part of the EU and the bloc negotiates trade deals for all its members.
Macron’s plea comes as European Union trade negotiators race to reach an agreement with the Trump administration by a deadline of July 9, when the U.S. president has threatened to raise across-the-board duties to 50 percent on European goods.
The EU-U.S. trade talks are expected to be discussed at an EU leaders’ summit in Brussels on Thursday directly following the NATO get-together.
German Chancellor Friedrich Merz this week criticized Brussels for being too slow and lacking focus in its dealings with Washington.
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