President of the EU Commission, Jean-Claude Juncker, said on Friday (11 November), when speaking at a conference in Luxembourg, that Donald Trump’s victory posed a danger for the ties between Europe and the United States. In his opinion, US President-Elect was ignorant of the EU and its actions. Mr Juncker suggested that “The election of Trump poses the risk of upsetting intercontinental relations in their foundation and in their structure“. Mr Juncker’s remarks generally reflected the shock among European leaders at the election of Mr Trump who had claimed, among other things, that there was no such thing as climate change, praised Russian President Putin and questioned the principle of collective defense in NATO.
Mr Trump’s commitment to Western security is among Mr Juncker’s greatest worries who warned against the “pernicious“ consequences of President-Elect’s statements. Mr Juncker said that Americans generally did not have much interest in Europe, recalling one of Mr Trump’s statements in which he referred to Belgium as to the city. “We will need to teach the President-Elect what Europe is and how it works,“ said Mr Juncker and brashly added that he thought “we will waste two years before Trump tours the world he does not know.“
EU ministers met on Sunday (13 November) during an emergency meeting discussing how to handle the relations with Washington over key issues. The EU has been working closely with the Obama administration on constructing economic pressure on the Kremlin over the Ukraine conflict and the Iran deal, forcing Tehran to scale back its nuclear program. EU diplomats admitted that the election of Mr Trump is a big unknown for the old continent, saying that for the first time in decades EU governments have very little idea what the next US President’s foreign policy will look like. To that end, German Foreign Minister Frank-Walter Steinmeier stressed that Europe must prepare for a “less predictable“ US foreign policy.
