Spain argues NATO funding ought to handle actual threats, not arbitrary targets, amidst Trump’s tariff retaliation plans.
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The European Fee and Spain’s authorities have dismissed US President Donald Trump’s newest risk to impose greater tariffs on Madrid over its refusal to satisfy his proposed NATO goal for defence spending.
Trump stated on Tuesday that he was “very sad” with Spain for being the one NATO member to reject the brand new spending goal of 5 % of financial output, including that he was contemplating punishing the Mediterranean nation.
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“I used to be pondering of giving them commerce punishment by way of tariffs due to what they did, and I believe I could do this,” Trump added. He had beforehand prompt making Spain “pay twice as a lot” in commerce talks.
Commerce coverage falls underneath the remit of Brussels, and the European Fee would “reply appropriately, as we all the time do, to any measures taken towards a number of of our member states”, fee spokesperson Olof Gill stated in a press briefing on Wednesday.
The commerce deal between the European Union and the USA signed in July was the proper platform to handle any points, Gill added.
“The defence spending debate is just not about rising spending for the sake of accelerating it, however about responding to actual threats,” Spain’s Financial system and Commerce Ministry stated in a press release.
“We’re doing our half to develop the mandatory capabilities and contribute to the collective defence of our allies.”
Spain has greater than doubled nominal defence spending from 0.98 % of gross home product in 2017 to 2 % this yr, equal to about 32.7bn euros ($38bn).
Defence Minister Margarita Robles stated allies weren’t discussing the 5 % goal for 2035 in Wednesday’s assembly as a result of they have been prioritising the current scenario in Ukraine, however wouldn’t utterly rule out a shift in Spain’s place.
Focused tariffs by the US towards particular person EU member states are uncommon, however there are precedents, stated Ignacio Garcia Bercero, a senior fellow on the Brussels-based financial assume tank Bruegel.
In 1999, the US hit the EU with one hundred pc punitive tariffs on merchandise reminiscent of chocolate, pork, onions and truffles in retaliation for an EU import ban on hormone-treated beef. However these tariffs excluded Britain, which on the time was nonetheless a member of the commerce bloc.
The US may impose anti-dumping penalties on European merchandise which are largely produced in Spain, stated Juan Carlos Martinez Lazaro, professor at Madrid’s IE enterprise faculty.
In 2018, Washington imposed a mix of duties of greater than 30 % on Spanish black desk olives on the request of Californian olive growers. Spain’s share of the US market plummeted from 49 % in 2017 to 19 % in 2024.
Another choice could be shifting the naval and air bases the US has in southern Spain to Morocco – an concept floated by former Trump official Robert Greenway – which might harm the native economies by way of the lack of 1000’s of oblique jobs.
