U.S. Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth said on Thursday he was confident that members of the NATO alliance would sign up to Donald Trump's demand for a major boost in defence spending, adding that it had to happen by a summit later in June, APA reports citing Reuters.
The U.S. president has said NATO allies should boost investment in defence to 5% of gross domestic product, up from the current target of 2%.
"To be an alliance, you got to be more than flags. You got to be formations. You got to be more than conferences," Hegseth said as he arrived at a gathering of NATO defence ministers in Brussels.
"We're here to continue the work that President Trump started, which is a commitment to 5% defence spending across this alliance, which we think will happen," Hegseth said, adding: "It has to happen by the summit at The Hague later this month."
Diplomats have said European allies understand that hiking defence expenditure is the price of ensuring a continued U.S. commitment to the continent's security and that keeping the U.S. on board means allowing Trump to be able to declare a win on his 5% demand during the summit, scheduled for June 24-25.
"That will be a considerable extra investment," NATO Secretary-General Mark Rutte told reporters, predicting that in the Hague summit "we will decide on a much higher spending target for all the nations in NATO."
In a bid to meet Trump's 5% goal, Rutte has proposed alliance members boost defence spending to 3.5% of GDP and commit a further 1.5% to broader security-related spending, Reuters has reported.
Details of the new investment plan will likely continue to be negotiated until the eve of the NATO summit.
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