ANKARA: President Donald Trump threw a summit of Nato leaders into disarray on Wednesday as he demanded the United States cut trade ties with Spain and made renewed claims on Greenland, but later changed tack and said there had been love and “a lot of unity”.
Speaking in the Turkish capital Ankara, Trump called Madrid a “terrible partner” in Nato as he railed against allies for not supporting the war on Iran and ordered Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent to halt all trade with Spain.
“Spain is a wasted cause. We don’t want to do any trade business with Spain anymore,” Trump said. “By the way, I’d like to cut it off. Spain is a terrible partner in Nato. They don’t participate, they don’t pay. I don’t want anything to do with Spain. Cut off all trade with Spain, including visits.”
Trump spoke alongside Nato Secretary General Mark Rutte, who has assiduously tried to assuage his concerns over defence spending, Iran and Greenland, while lavishing praise on the president for bringing such issues to the fore.
But emerging from a closed-door meeting of NATO leaders, Trump later said: “There was a lot of love in that room, a lot of unity.”
He also spoke more warmly of Volodymyr Zelensky when he met the Ukrainian president, in stark contrast to the tongue-lashing he gave him at a White House meeting last year.
In a potential boost to Ukraine, Trump said he would give Kyiv a licence to make Patriot missiles at a time when Russia has stepped up its air war on cities with deadly strikes, exploiting Ukraine’s shortage of air defences.
Trump on informed his Syrian counterpart Ahmed al-Sharaa that he had decided to remove the country from the US list of designated state sponsors of terrorism.
“I promised to remove all barriers stopping you from rebuilding your country, and very soon, you will finally be able to do so,” Trump wrote in a letter to Sharaa seen by Reuters.
“We have US companies ready to invest in Syria and help make your country greater and more prosperous than ever before,” he added in the letter that a senior US administration official said was handed to al-Sharaa after their meeting in Ankara on Wednesday.
Trump said he had notified Congress which will now conduct a 45-day review before the decision can take effect.
The designation as a state sponsor of terrorism carries restrictions on US foreign assistance, defence exports and certain financial transactions.
Last month Trump signed an executive order terminating a US sanctions programme on Syria, allowing an end to the country’s isolation from the international financial system.
“I would say to (Russian President Vladimir) Putin, you should have some more discussions yourself out in the open. That makes you stronger,” Rutte told Reuters in an interview.
“What he has seen now is sometimes allies disagreeing a bit, having a bit of a quarrel, and then coming together and reuniting.”
Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan, who won plaudits from Trump throughout the two-day summit, said Ankara was ready to assume greater responsibility for burden-sharing within Nato. He said the summit had laid the foundations for a stronger alliance.
Spanish Prime Minister Pedro Sanchez later said he had a “very cordial” conversation with Trump in which the pair discussed the soccer World Cup, which the US is hosting, and golf, but not military spending.
