LONDON (AP) – U.S. President Donald Trump and his NATO counterparts were gathering in London Tuesday to mark the alliance’s 70th birthday amid deep tensions as spats between leaders expose a lack of unity that risks undermining military organization’s credibility.
For the third summit in a row, Trump is expected to renew demands that European allies and Canada step up defense spending.
As NATO leaders trade barbs, Kremlin spokesman Dmitry Peskov says that Russia is watching developments at the alliance’s meeting “with great attention.”
The 29-country trans-Atlantic military alliance was founded in 1949 to provide collective security for Europe against what was then the Soviet Union.
Peskov said Tuesday that NATO is “a product of the era of confrontation, the Cold War era,” something he says that Russia does not want to return to. But he says that “an alliance that was created and shaped by the confrontation ideology, of course, can’t bring anything else” but confrontation.
Turkey’s increasingly close relations with Moscow – and its purchase of Russian air defense systems that are incompatible with NATO equipment – has added to tensions among the allies. But Peskov says those ties are not hurting NATO. France, meanwhile, also wants closer ties with Russia.
