Does Trump with tariffs violate NATO contract?
US President Donald Trump violates his Total decisions At the expense of Allies against the founding contract of NATO? Secretary General Mark Rutte answers this question with a clear no. In the past, there have been differences in opinion regarding the legality of tariffs, the former Dutch Prime Minister said after a NATO Foreign Ministers’ meeting in Brussels. In these cases, no violations of the contract had also been determined.
At the NATO meeting, the Norwegian Foreign Minister Espen Barth Eide had previously brought Trump’s unprecedented pay decisions in connection with Article 2 of the North Atlantic Treaty. This states that the contracting parties « will endeavor to eliminate opposites in their international economic policy and to promote economic cooperation between individual or all parties ».
NATO partners criticize Trump’s tariffs
In this context, Eide also pointed out that tariffs could affect economic growth and thus also the planned increase in defense spending in Europe. Protectionism will not help to build a stronger defense, he said. For example, the managing German Foreign Minister Annalena Baerbock and her colleagues from France and Finland also commented very critically about the tariffs.
Rutte did not want to share his opinion on the subject of tariffs on Friday. « I don’t think I will help this alliance when I express myself to something that is not really part of the alliance policy, » he said. In his view, the national states would have to take care of the tariffs and their effects while he had the task of ensuring defense ability.
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At possibly falling state income from the tariffs, he said that it could always happen that expected money was not available – be it because of inflation because the gross domestic product does not grow as previously forecast or for other reasons.
In NATO circles it is also pointed out that there are no real sanction options to punish violations of the NATO contract. It would only be conceivable that affected states apply for internal consultations on the subject.
