US secretary of state has been meeting Italian leader amid strained tensions over IranThe European Commission also insisted that airlines must not charge customers extra fuel fees after they have already bought tickets, as the aviation sector feels the pain from high energy prices because of the Middle East war, AFP reported.“Airlines may adapt their published fares to the situation, but adding a fuel surcharge to a ticket after it has been bought cannot
Rubio also gets asked about his meeting with Italy’s Meloni amid US president Trump’s threats to pull US troops from Europe .
He says it is a decision to be made by the president.
But he continues: “I said publicly, and I’ve said repeatedly, I’ve been a strong supporter of Nato throughout my career in the Senate and even now, and one of the advantages of being in Nato is that it allows us to have forces deployed in Europe and bases that allow us a logistical ability to project power in case of contingencies.
We had a contingency and some countries in Europe, some countries in Europe like Spain as an example, denied us the use of those bases for a very important contingency that in some ways, the denial of those bases actually impeded the mission, not severely but had a cost and in fact, even created some unnecessary dangers.” In a particularly strong line, he says: “If one of the main reasons why the US is in Nato is the ability to have forces deployed in Europe that we could project to other contingencies, and now that’s no longer the case, at least when it comes to some Nato members, that’s a problem and has to be examined.
” He repeats that ultimately it’s the president’s decision to make, and there is no news so far.
He stresses that the partial withdrawal of US troops from Germany only accounts for “less than 14% of our total troop presence there ” and it is part of a “pre-programmed” plan to “shift” some burden within Nato.
