Donald Trump's latest comments on Nato have caused "worry" in the alliance, Germany's foreign minister says.
Donald Trump Photo: AFP
Mr Trump called Nato "obsolete" because it "wasn't taking care of terror".
The US president-elect was giving an interview in New York to two British and German newspapers, the Times and Bild, at Trump Tower.
Nato, he said, was "very important" to him but only five of its 28 member-states were paying their fair share and that, he said, was "very unfair to the United States".
German Foreign Minister Frank-Walter Steinmeier said it was a contradiction of comments made days ago by Mr Trump's incoming defence chief.
Frank-Walter Steinmeier said Mr Trump's comments on Nato caused "worry". Photo: AFP / NASA
Figures released by Nato show that just five member-states met or surpassed its defence spending goal - 2 percent of GDP - last year.
Speaking in Brussels after consulting Nato Secretary-General Jens Stoltenberg, Mr Steinmeier said the president-elect's comments had caused "worry and concern".
"This is in contradiction with what the American defence minister said in his hearing in Washington only some days ago," the German foreign minister said.
At his Senate confirmation hearing last week, Mr Trump's choice for defence secretary, Gen James Mattis, had described Nato as central to US defence, and had accused Russian President Vladimir Putin of trying to "break" the alliance.
Later, Mr Steinmeier was quoted by Reuters news agency as saying: "I've spoken today not only with EU foreign ministers but Nato foreign ministers as well and can report that the signals are that there's been no easing of tensions."
Only last week, the US deployed 3000 soldiers, 80 tanks and hundreds of armoured vehicles to Poland in a move by President Barack Obama to reassure Nato allies concerned about a more aggressive Russia.
President Putin's official spokesman, Dmitry Peskov, said on Monday it was too early to give a full response to a suggestion by Mr Trump that US sanctions against Russia over Ukraine could be dropped in return for a nuclear warhead reduction deal.
Mr Trump also said German Chancellor Angela Merkel had made "a catastrophic mistake" by admitting more than one million migrants.
Import tariffs
Mr Trump also threatened German car makers with high import tariffs.
Shares in BMW, Volkswagen and Daimler fell after he warned that cars built in Mexico, where they have invested in factories, would be taxed at 35% if exported to the US.
BMW said the company would stick to its plans to open a Mexican plant in 2019.
Elsewhere in his interview, Mr Trump said:
- Russia's military intervention in Syria had been "a very bad thing" which had created a "terrible humanitarian situation"
- Said Afghanistan was "going badly" while the offensive to retake Mosul from so-called Islamic State in Iraq had turned out to be a disaster
- Described the Iran nuclear agreement as "one of the dumbest deals I have ever seen"
- Likened the US-led invasion of Iraq in 2003 to "throwing rocks into a beehive"
- Promised to "keep" Twitter as president, saying, "I can go bing, bing bing" and respond to "dishonest" news
- BBC