(Adnkronos) – Italy’s foreign minister Antonio Tajani has called off a visit to the United States on Monday due to president Donald Trump’s “serious and offensive” remarks about premier Giorgia Meloni after this week’s G7 summit in France, the minister has announced.
“I had to cancel my visit to the US scheduled for Monday and Tuesday following the US president’s serious and offensive remarks directed at the Italian prime minister,” Tajani said during a swearing-in ceremony on Friday at the foreign ministry for newly qualified diplomats.
“No one is allow to offend Italy like the US did,” said Tajani, who had been due to co-chair a business forum in Miami with US counterpart Marco Rubio and hold bilateral talks with him.
In an interview with La7 television channel aired on Friday, Trump said Meloni had “begged” him for a photo with her at the G7 summit held in Evian from Monday to Wednesday and said he “felt sorry” for her.
“She (Meloni) begged me to take a picture with her. She wanted a photo with me so badly,” Trump told La7.
“I wouldn’t have taken it with her but I felt sorry for her,” Trump added.
Meloni stated that she was “stunned” by Trump’s claim, saying it was made up and underlined that she “never” begs and neither does Italy.
“Frankly, I am stunned. Italy and I never beg. Some things deserve an immediate response,” Meloni wrote on Instagram.
Meloni and Trump previously enjoyed a warm relations and she was the only European leader invited to his inauguration last year. But the relationship soured in recent months with the US-Israel war on Iran when Italy refused to allow US fighter jets to use its military bases.
In an interview with Corriere della Sera daily on 7 April, Trump called out Meloni saying she was “unacceptable”.
“I thought she (Meloni) had courage. I was wrong,” Trump added.
In a previous interview in March with Corriere della Sera, Trump struck a very different tone, lauding Meloni and saying: “She always tried to help, she is an excellent leader and she is a friend of mine.”
