\u201cNo, I absolutely don\u2019t regret anything I\u2019ve done,\u201d says Meloni at the end of Nato summit in Ankara
\nMilan
\nItalian Prime Minister Giorgia Meloni said on Wednesday she did not regret her efforts to forge close ties with US President Donald Trump, despite a series of public disagreements that have strained relations between the erstwhile friends.
\nMeloni was once seen as one of Trump\u2019s closest allies in Europe, but in recent months she has become the target of attacks from the White House leader in media interviews and social media posts.
\n\u201cNo, I absolutely don\u2019t regret anything I\u2019ve done,\u201d Meloni said in Ankara, at the end of a Nato summit also attended by Trump, when asked whether she had second thoughts about the political capital she had invested in the US president.
\nTrump\u2019s first public criticism of Meloni came in April, after she rebuked him for attacking Pope Leo over the pontiff\u2019s condemnation of the Iran war.
\nIn March, Italy denied permission for US military aircraft bound for the Middle East to land at the Sigonella air base in Sicily.
\nThe Italian leader, who was the only European head of government to attend Trump\u2019s inauguration last year, declined to respond to Sunday\u2019s social media post by Trump showing her looking up at him with the caption: \u201cRESTRAINING ORDER NEEDED\u201d.
\n\u201cI made that political investment because I believe in the unity of the West. It\u2019s not a strategy I adopted with Trump\u2019s arrival, but one I have pursued with all my counterparts,\u201d she said.
\nMeloni acknowledged that \u201cthings are going the way we have seen\u201d between her and Trump, but stressed that they still shared common ground on issues including immigration and opposition to what she described as \u201cwoke culture\u201d.
\nAt the Nato summit, Trump struck a more conciliatory tone, describing Meloni as \u201ca nice person\u201d, while renewing criticism of her for not doing more to support his military attacks on Iran, which are expected to resume.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
\u201cNo, I absolutely don\u2019t regret anything I\u2019ve done,\u201d says Meloni at the end of Nato summit in Ankara Milan Italian Prime Minister Giorgia Meloni said on Wednesday she did not regret her efforts to forge close ties with US President Donald Trump, despite a series of public disagreements that have strained relations between the erstwhile […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":555334,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[6],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-555322","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-world"],"yoast_head":"\n