Trump says Nato obsolete, shocked Europe hits back

Brussels: Angela Merkel led a sharp European response to US President-elect Donald Trump on Monday after he branded the Nato alliance “obsolete” and criticised the German Chancellor’s open-door refugee policy.

In a hard-hitting interview with two European newspapers, Trump unleashed a volley of verbal attacks on Europe hailing Britain’s decision to leave the European Union and saying more countries were going to quit the bloc.

“We Europeans have our fate in our own hands,” Merkel told reporters in Berlin when asked about Trump’s criticisms adding that she will work towards getting the EU to strengthen the economy and fight terrorism. Germany’s foreign minister Frank-Walter Steinmeier said that Europe was stunned by Trump’s remarks on Nato just five days ahead of the billionaire businessman’s inauguration as President.

“The interview statements of the American President-elect... caused, indeed here in Brussels, astonishment and agitation,” Steinmeier said as he went from a meeting with Nato chief Jens Stoltenberg to talks with EU counterparts.

France’s top diplomat Jean-Marc Ayrault said that “the best response” to Trump’s comments was “the unity of Europeans”.

Trump’s latest remarks have in particular caused further consternation among eastern European Nato countries nervous about Moscow following Russia’s annexation of Crimea and involvement in Ukraine. “I said a long time ago that Nato had problems,” Trump told The Times of London and Bild on Friday.