Richard Marles refuses to ‘speculate’ on possible Trump meet

Anthony Albanese’s deputy remained tight-lipped on whether he will meet Donald Trump ahead of a major summit this week.

Deputy Prime Minister Richard Marles has refused to “speculate” if he will meet Donald Trump on the sidelines of a NATO summit this week.

The US President is planning to meet with the Indo-Pacific Four (IP4) at the summit in the Netherlands, Nikkei has reported.

IP4 countries are Australia, Japan, New Zealand and South Korea.

They are not part of NATO but work with the alliance on shared interests in the Indo-Pacific.

Speaking to reporters in London overnight, Mr Marles would not confirm if a meeting with Mr Trump had been teed up.

US President Donald Trump could meet Deputy Prime Minister Richard Marles at the NATO summit in the Netherlands. Picture: AFP / Ludovic Marin / NewsWire / Martin Ollman

“I’m not about to speculate on what meetings I have at NATO,” he said.

“I’m really looking forward to the meetings at NATO.

“We’ll work up our program of meetings which go alongside the main NATO meetings, and we’ll take it from there.”

If a meeting went ahead, it would mean Mr Marles got to have a face-to-face with Mr Trump before Anthony Albanese.

The Prime Minister was last week weighing up whether to go to the summit after his scheduled meet with Mr Trump at the G7 fell through.

The US leader bailed on the dialogue in Canada due to the conflict in the Middle East.

Pressure has been mounting on Mr Albanese to secure another meeting amid fears AUKUS could be on the rocks and tensions between Canberra and Washington over Australia’s comparatively low defence spending.

Prime Minister Anthony Albanese says he will meet US President Donald Trump when it is ‘convenient’. Picture: NewsWire / Martin Ollman

Speaking to Sky on Tuesday, he insisted the Australia-US alliance was solid and that he and Mr Trump had agreed to meet at a “convenient” time.

He also rejected that he should have attended the NATO, noting other IP4 leaders were not attending.

“The president of Korea is not there, the prime minister of Japan is not there,” Mr Albanese said.

“In terms of the IP4, three of the four leaders aren’t there.

“That was a part of the decision-making process that we made.

“NATO is about NATO – it’s about all of the countries that are a part of the North Atlantic Treaty Organisation.

“Of course, it is appropriate that the Defence Minister attend the meeting.”

Originally published as Richard Marles refuses to ‘speculate’ on possible Trump meet