WASHINGTON: An Air Force plane carrying Secretary of State Marco Rubio and the Senate Foreign Relations Committee chairman, Sen. Jim Risch, to Germany for the Munich Security Conference was forced to return to Washington late Thursday after developing a mechanical issue.
“This evening, en route from Washington to Munich, the plane on which Secretary Rubio is flying experienced a mechanical issue,” State Department spokeswoman Tammy Bruce said.
“The plane has turned around and is returning to Joint Base Andrews,” she said. “The secretary intends to continue his travel to Germany and the Middle East on a separate aircraft.”
The issue with what one official said had to do with the cockpit windshield on the C-32, a converted Boeing 757, occurred about 90 minutes after the flight took off from Joint Base Andrews outside of Washington.
Although Rubio plans to resume his journey on a new plane, it was not immediately clear if the delay would cause him to miss a scheduled Friday morning meeting with Vice President JD Vance and Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky in Munich.
Plane carrying Secretary of State Rubio to Europe turned around because of a mechanical issue
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Plane carrying Secretary of State Rubio to Europe turned around because of a mechanical issue
- Rubio intended to continue his travel to Germany and the Middle East on a separate aircraft
EU leaders reject Trump’s tariffs threat over Greenland
- “We won’t let ourselves be intimidated,” Kristersson said
- “Only Denmark and Greenland decide questions that concern them”
AMSTERDAM: The Netherlands’ foreign minister on Sunday said that US President Donald Trump’s threat to impose new tariffs on European allies until they agree to sell Greenland to the United States is “blackmail.”
“It’s blackmail what he’s doing ... and it’s not necessary. It doesn’t help the alliance (NATO) and it also doesn’t help Greenland,” David van Weel said in an interview on Dutch television.
In a post on Truth Social on Saturday, Trump said additional 10 percent import tariffs would take effect on February 1 on goods from Denmark, Norway, Sweden, France, Germany, the Netherlands, Finland and Great Britain — countries that have agreed to contribute personnel to a NATO exercise on Greenland.
Van Weel said the Greenland mission was intended to show the US Europe’s willingness to help defend Greenland and he was opposed to Trump making a connection with diplomacy over the island and trade.
Swedish Prime Minister Ulf Kristersson earlier rejected Trump’s threat to European nations of swinging tariffs if they did not let him acquire Greenland.
“We won’t let ourselves be intimidated,” he said in a message sent to AFP. “Only Denmark and Greenland decide questions that concern them.
“I will always defend my country and our allied neighbors,” he added, stressing that this was “a European question.
“Sweden is currently having intensive discussions with other EU countries, Norway and the United Kingdom to find a joint response,” he added.
