NATO Secretary General says allies raise defence spending to about 4% of GDP

NATO Secretary General Mark Rutte says NATO allies have increased defence spending to around 4% of GDP. He made the comment ahead of the Ankara summit, citing that European allies and Canada spend nearly 20% more on “core defence” than in the previous year. Rutte connects the increase to NATO’s longer-term 10-year effort to reach a 5% of GDP target by 2035, describing a breakdown of 3.5% for core defence and 1.5% for security infrastructure. His remarks also address recent criticism from former U.S. President Donald Trump about allies’ commitment to defence spending.

Rutte says NATO needs concrete plans presented this week. At the same time, outside experts—including SIPRI—caution that how NATO defines the 1.5% “resilience” or security-infrastructure portion could allow for “creative accounting” if it is too broadly described. The reports also point to an EU-wide increase in core defence spending in 2025 of about 20%, reaching €418 billion.