Donald Trump at NATO meeting
© AFP/Thierry Charlier
U.S. President Donald Trump has urged leaders from the 27 other NATO member states to do more to fight terrorism and to put immigration and threats from Russia at the top of their agenda.

"The NATO of the future must include a great focus on terrorism and immigration as well as threats from Russia and NATO's eastern and southern borders," Trump told fellow leaders at NATO headquarters on May 25.

Trump, who once characterized the security alliance as "obsolete," also reiterated his demand that member nations make "their full and complete contributions" to the Western alliance by increasing their defense spending.

"This is not fair to the people and taxpayers of the United States," Trump said. "If NATO countries made their full and complete contributions, then NATO would be even stronger than it is today, especially from the threat of terrorism."

NATO member nations in the past have vowed to increase their defense spending to 2 percent of their gross domestic product (GDP) by 2024. Currently, only Britain, Estonia, Greece, Poland, and the United States have reached that level.

The president did not make any mention of Article 5, the NATO alliance's mutual-defense pact that states an attack on one member constitutes an attack on all members.

White House press secretary Sean Spicer, when asked about U.S. commitment to Article 5, said, "It goes without saying. [Trump's] presence at this event underscores our commitments and treaty obligations."

At NATO headquarters, Trump attended the unveiling of two new memorials -- one dedicated to the September 11, 2001, terrorist attacks against the United States and the other to the Berlin Wall that divided the city for nearly three decades during the Cold War.

"Each one marks a pivotal event in the history of this alliance and in the eternal battle between good and evil," Trump said.

"On one side, a testament of the triumph of our ideals over a totalitarian communist ideology bent on the oppression of millions and millions of people," he added. "On the other, a painful reminder of the barbaric evil that still exists in the world and that we must confront and defeat together as group, as a world."

The alliance's leaders are hoping to prove to Trump as he visits their new billion-dollar, state-of-the-art headquarters that the alliance is more relevant than ever and ready to combat terrorism against the backdrop of the May 22 bombing in Manchester, England, that killed 22 people.

Secretary-General Jens Stoltenberg said earlier on May 25 that alliance members will agree to NATO's participation in the international coalition against the extremist group Islamic State (IS), one of the main themes the U.S. president is expected to stress during the summit.

Trump, on his first foreign trip since taking office in January, also was met by thousands of protesters in Brussels saying he was not welcome in a city he once referred to as a "hellhole" despite the red-carpet treatment NATO and EU officials are rolling out.

"I am happy that all NATO member states will underline that NATO is the central pillar of our common security, that we feel united in solidarity for our common security," German Chancellor Andrea Merkel said as she arrived for the meeting.

Trump slammed NATO as being "obsolete" during the U.S. presidential campaign, saying it was failing to focus on the threat from Islamist terrorism and meet its defense spending commitments.

But he said in April that it was "no longer obsolete" after many allies -- following repeated exhortations by senior U.S. officials earlier this year -- started making plans to increase their military spending and incorporate counterterrorism into NATO's mission.

The agreement for NATO to join the Global Coalition "will send a strong political message of NATO's commitment to the fight against terrorism," Stoltenberg said ahead of the meeting, the first such gathering to be attended by Trump.

However, Stoltenberg stressed the plan did not provide for NATO taking on a combat role in the fight against IS and other extremist groups in Syria and Iraq.

All 28 NATO members are already individually members of the 68-nation U.S.-led Global Coalition, whose goal is to defeat IS, but NATO as an organization has not followed suit until now despite pressure from the United States.

Member states such as France, Germany, and Italy had reportedly opposed such a move to avoid dragging the alliance into a ground war and risk harming relations with Arab powers.

"I am confident that under constructive leadership of President Trump, NATO will continue to play a key role in transatlantic security and defense," Estonian Prime Minister Juri Ratas said.

The carefully choreographed visit, however, hit a bump in Trump's first meeting with European Union officials where they failed to find common ground on several issues.

European Council President Donald Tusk told reporters in that while there was agreement on issues such as counterterrorism, there are differences on other key areas such as climate change, trade, and Russia.

"I am not 100 percent sure we can say today -- we means [Trump] and myself -- that we have a common position, common opinion about Russia," Tusk said after the meeting. "Although when it comes to the conflict in Ukraine, it seems that we were on the same line."

The former Polish prime minister also called for the promotion of "Western values."

"My main message to President Trump was that what gives our cooperation and friendship its deepest meaning are fundamental Western values like freedom, human rights and respect for human dignity," Tusk said. "The greatest task today is the consolidation of the whole free world around those values -- not just interests. Values and principles first. This is what we, Europe and America, should be saying."

Stoltenberg said NATO would expand the role of its AWACS surveillance planes in supporting anti-IS operations and step up training programs in Iraq.

NATO, which announced it will officially accept Montenegro as its 29th member on June 5, will agree on an action plan to better fight terrorism in Europe, create a specialized cell at the alliance's headquarters, and appoint a coordinator of antiterrorism operations.

He said the allies would also meet Trump's demands to share more of the security burden and reaffirm a commitment to spend 2 percent of annual GDP on defense. Washington funds about 70 percent of NATO spending, and all members share the costs of running the alliance's day-to-day administration and building costs.

With reporting by AFP, AP and Reuters