Nato denies its Secretary-General said Trump has a '12-second attention span'

A North Atlantic Treaty Organisation (Nato) spokesperson is denying a report that the Secretary-General of the military alliance said Donald Trump has a 12 second attention span.

Oana Longescu tweeted that Jens Stoltenberg did not, in fact, comment on the US president’s lack of focus.

Politico reported that he had, citing a senior White House official who also said Mr Trump was not prepared for his meeting with Mr Stoltenberg.

Mr Trump has criticised Nato in the past, saying it is “unfair” to the US because of what he feels are the country’s outsized contributions compared to other countries like Germany.

There are 28 member countries and the US is one of the five members meeting an obligation to contribute two per cent of their GDP to Nato.

After his meeting with Mr Stoltenberg, Mr Trump seemed to change his stance a bit.

“They made a change and now they do fight terrorism. I said it was obsolete. It’s no longer obsolete.”

Nato did not start to “fight terrorism” because of Mr Trump.

Mr Stoltenberg after the same meeting said: “for me, the important thing is that [Mr Trump] has been very consistent when it comes to NATO in all my interactions and conversations with him.”

The denial of the claim also comes on the heels of another report that Nato members will be tailoring the upcoming meeting to Mr Trump’s mercurial mood and alleged inability to focus.

Foreign Policy reported that members are limiting their speeches to two to four minutes and there will be no final statement to clarify a cohesive alliance strategy as has been published in the past.

A Nato source told Foreign Policy “it’s like they’re preparing to deal with a child...who has no knowledge of NATO, no interest in in-depth policy issues, nothing.”

“They’re freaking out,” said the source.

Mr Trump is set to attend the Nato summit 24-25 May in Brussels, Belgium.