Italy will no longer respond to Trump’s provocations, the foreign minister said before the NATO summit Today’s news
Italy will no longer respond to provocative remarks by US President Donald Trump, Foreign Minister Antonio Tajani said in an interview on Tuesday as NATO leaders prepared for a meeting in Turkey, according to Reuters.
The comments come after Prime Minister Giorgia Meloni last month accused Trump of making up about her, Reuters reported, after the US president told an Italian TV channel that she “begged” him to take a photo with her at the G7 summit in France.
Trump renews dispute ahead of NATO summit
With the two leaders due to attend a NATO summit in Ankara on Tuesday and Wednesday, Trump appeared to reignite the spat when he posted a picture of Meloni looking up at him on Truth Social with the caption “RESTRACT ORDER NECESSARY”.
Responding to the post, Tajani told Italian newspaper La Stampa, quoted by Reuters, that Trump “speaks for himself,” adding that the US president “likes to provoke, especially on social media.” He said Italy had “decided not to respond to these remarks in order not to inflame disputes between our allies”. Tajani went on to say that Italy remains and will continue to be a friend of the United States and serve as a strategic partner for both Italy and Europe.
Meloni was once among Trump’s most vocal European supporters and was the only European leader to attend his inauguration in 2025. But she criticized him this year after he lashed out at Pope Leo over the pope’s condemnation of the Iran conflict, a rebuke that reportedly prompted Trump to accuse her of lacking courage.
Meloni has long held an unusual position among European leaders, cultivating a personal relationship with Trump even as she has sought to stay in line with the European Union’s broader stances on trade, Ukraine and multilateral diplomacy. Her attempts to balance that relationship have regularly come under scrutiny at home, especially when Trump’s remarks seem to test the limits of that closeness, as was the case with his comments on the G7 photo and his more recent social media post.
Reuters also noted that Italian newspaper Il Foglio mocked Trump’s taunts on its front page on Tuesday, publishing a picture of the US president with Russian President Vladimir Putin under the same headline: “CONSTRAINT ORDER NECESSARY”.
The episode unfolded as NATO leaders gathered in Ankara for a summit expected to focus on member states’ defense spending commitments and continued alliance support for Ukraine, matters on which Trump has repeatedly urged European allies to shoulder a greater share of the burden.
