‘You have to be serious’: Macron criticises Trump’s mixed messages about Nato and Iran

Speaking in South Korea, the French president defended the transatlantic alliance and called for return to peace Emmanuel Macron has sharply criticised Donald Trump’s inconsistent and often contradictory pronouncements on the Iran war and Nato, saying if “you want to be serious” it was better not to come out with something different every day. “There is too much talk … and it’s all over the place,” the French president said on Thursday during a state visit to South Korea. “We all need stability, calm, a return to peace – this isn’t a show!” Macron added: “You have to be serious. When you want to be serious, you don’t go around saying the opposite every day of what you just said the day before. And perhaps you shouldn’t talk every day.” Macron also mounted a strong defence of Nato, accusing Trump of undermining the transatlantic defence alliance through repeated remarks questioning the United States’s commitment to its continued membership. “I believe organisations and alliances like Nato are defined by what is left unsaid – that is, the trust that underpins them,” he said. “If you cast doubt on your commitment every day, you erode its very su