00:00NATO Secretary General Mark Rutte visited the White House to meet with U.S. President
00:06Donald Trump.
00:07The meeting took place on the same day that Russian President Vladimir Putin agreed in
00:11principle with the U.S. proposal for a ceasefire in its war on Ukraine.
00:16Many items were on the agenda, chief among them the Kremlin's invasion of Kiev.
00:20We're going to be discussing a lot of things, obviously we'll be discussing what's happening
00:25with respect to Ukraine and Russia.
00:28At this moment we have people talking in Russia, we have representatives over there, Steve
00:33Witkoff and others, and they're in very serious discussions.
00:39Also on the agenda was U.S.-Europe defense cooperation and Washington's commitment to
00:43NATO after Trump had made repeated threats to withdraw the U.S. from the military alliance.
00:49Trump and Rutte did not schedule a post-meeting press conference, but speaking to reporters
00:53in the Oval Office, Rutte hailed Europe's latest efforts to bolster its defenses and
00:58commitment to increase military spending.
01:00What's happened the last couple of weeks is really staggering.
01:04The Europeans committing to a package of 800 billion defense spending, the Germans now
01:10potentially up to half a trillion extra in defense spending, and then of course you have
01:14Keir Starmer here, the British Prime Minister and others, all committing to much higher
01:18defense spending.
01:19We're not there, we need to do more, but I really want to work together with you in a
01:24run-up to the D-Day summit to make sure that we will have a NATO which is really reinvigorated
01:29under your leadership.
01:32The pair also discussed Greenland, which Trump has been eyeing to take under U.S. control.
01:37The 47th U.S. president renewed his interest in the Arctic island under the Danish crown,
01:42adding that the NATO boss could be instrumental to realizing that goal.
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