US President Donald Trump has hailed Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan as "a great leader" and described the two-day NATO summit in Ankara as "very successful."
"We just concluded a very successful NATO summit here in Türkiye," Trump said at a news conference on Wednesday as the two-day NATO summit ended in the Turkish capital.
Trump thanked Erdogan for hosting the summit.
"I want to thank President Erdogan, who's really a great man. He's a great leader. He's a friend of mine, been a friend of mine for a long time. He's a strong person, a very strong personality, and that's why he runs such a successful and good country," he added.
The summit brought together leaders of the 32-member alliance, as well as key allies to discuss Europe’s defence capacity, the alliance’s defence spending targets, military modernisation and continued support for Ukraine.
Trump said they discussed the target of spending 5% of GDP on defence.
He added that at last year's NATO summit in The Hague, the allies achieved "an unprecedented agreement" to increase the benchmark annual defence spending from 2 percent to 5 percent of GDP.
'There was tremendous unity in the summit'
The president said that as a result of the commitment last year, defence spending by other NATO members surged by almost $150 billion in 2025.
"In the working session this morning, we discussed the progress other members are making towards the 5% target,” he said. “Some have truly answered the call, and others are making big changes and will be answering the call.”
Trump said there was "tremendous unity" at the summit.
"And I urge all nations to accelerate their plans to get the benchmark as quickly as possible. The benchmark is going to be that 5 percent number, that's the number it should have been for years," he added.
He again praised the summit, saying that "this was a tremendously successful summit. And again, I want to thank President Erdogan."
