Trump to attend NATO summit in The Hague, White House confirms
Donald Trump, President of the United States (Getty Images)
US President Donald Trump will take part in the NATO summit scheduled for June 24–25 in The Hague, White House Press Secretary Karoline Leavitt announced during a briefing.
"I can confirm he will be going to the NATO summit. Yes," Leavitt told reporters.
According to her, the US President will aim to rally NATO members to increase defense spending to 5%. Of that, 3.5% of GDP would go toward core defense, and the remaining 1.5% toward other defense-related areas such as infrastructure, cybersecurity, and civil preparedness.
NATO summit in The Hague
The upcoming NATO summit will take place in The Hague, Netherlands, on June 24–25.
Recently, media outlets reported that US President Donald Trump would attend the summit. Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy has also received an invitation to the meeting.
Today, Zelenskyy confirmed that Ukraine was officially invited to the NATO summit in The Hague.
According to Radio Free Europe, the summit will be shortened from three days to two — reportedly due to concerns within the Alliance about potential controversy involving Trump.
The outlet recalled the 2018 NATO summit in Brussels during Trump's first term, when a tense exchange with former Secretary General Jens Stoltenberg set the tone for the meeting. At that time, Trump even threatened to withdraw the United States from the alliance.
To minimize the risk of confrontation, this year's event has been shortened. While the final program is still being finalized, the current plan is to hold an official dinner on the first day, followed by two working sessions on the second day — one focused on defense spending and the other on developing the defense industry.
