{"id":11470,"date":"2026-04-24T10:24:06","date_gmt":"2026-04-24T10:24:06","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/globalnewstoday.uk\/index.php\/2026\/04\/24\/sanchez-sidesteps-a-spain-us-dispute-at-nato-brushing-off-reported-pentagon-email-wsls\/"},"modified":"2026-04-24T10:24:06","modified_gmt":"2026-04-24T10:24:06","slug":"sanchez-sidesteps-a-spain-us-dispute-at-nato-brushing-off-reported-pentagon-email-wsls","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/globalnewstoday.uk\/index.php\/2026\/04\/24\/sanchez-sidesteps-a-spain-us-dispute-at-nato-brushing-off-reported-pentagon-email-wsls\/","title":{"rendered":"S\u00e1nchez sidesteps a Spain-US dispute at NATO, brushing off reported Pentagon email &#8211; WSLS"},"content":{"rendered":"<p>Menelaos Hadjicostis And Lorne Cook<br \/>Associated Press<br \/>Published:\u00a0<time datetime=\"2026-04-24T09:40:34.000Z\">April 24, 2026 at 5:40 AM<\/time><br \/>Menelaos Hadjicostis And Lorne Cook<br \/>Associated Press<br \/>Copyright 2026 The Associated Press. All rights reserved<br \/>Spain&#8217;s Prime Minister Pedro Sanchez arrives for the EU Summit in Nicosia, Cyprus, Friday, April 24, 2026. (AP Photo\/Petros Karadjias)<br \/><strong>NICOSIA<\/strong> \u2013 Spanish Prime Minister Pedro S\u00e1nchez on Friday refused to be drawn into a dispute with the United States over reports that the Pentagon is weighing whether to punish members of NATO that fail to support American operations in the <a href=\"https:\/\/apnews.com\/hub\/iran\">Iran war<\/a>.<br \/>Among those in the firing line is Spain, which has <a href=\"https:\/\/apnews.com\/article\/trump-spain-united-states-iran-war-05e23ef4e0bda9cb226a16b10cd9437c\">refused to allow<\/a> U.S. forces involved in the war to use bases on its territory or airspace. Spain says that U.S.-Israeli actions in the Iran war contravenes international law.<br \/>Recommended Videos<br \/>The Pentagon is reported to be mulling whether to suspend Spain from NATO, according to an unidentified U.S. official referring to a U.S. Defense Department email, and quoted by the Reuters news agency.<br \/>\u201cWell, we do not work with emails,&#8221; S\u00e1nchez told reporters at a European Union summit in Cyprus. &#8220;We work with official documents and positions taken, in this case, by the government of the United States.\u201d <br \/>\u201cThe position of the government of Spain is clear: absolute collaboration with the allies, but always within the framework of international legality,\u201d he said.<br \/>NATO operates by consensus. The trans-Atlantic alliance&#8217;s founding treaty has no mechanism for suspending or ejecting any of the 32 member countries, although nations may leave of their own accord one year after notifying the other allies. As an organization, NATO has no direct role in the Iran war except to <a href=\"https:\/\/apnews.com\/71c609cdb15e93a2b4070108a99f0a6a\">defend its own territory<\/a>.<br \/>U.S. President <a href=\"https:\/\/apnews.com\/article\/trump-nato-rutte-iran-war-981d250a7265774a4913b63d8797fc34\">Donald Trump has been angered<\/a> by what he sees as the failure of some NATO members to back American actions in the Iran war and to help police the Strait of Hormuz, a major trade route. He has questioned the purpose of U.S. membership in the military organization.<br \/>EU foreign policy chief Kaja Kallas appeared perplexed by the U.S. criticism, given that the United Kingdom and France are leading an effort to help secure trade in the strait once the war is over.<br \/>\u201cWhen we have had contacts with the American counterparts, then actually their asks for us have been exactly what we are able to offer after the cessation of hostilities,\u201d she said. \u201cDemining, escorting of ships, all of this that we have been discussing.\u201d<br \/>But the United States has \u201clong-standing arrangements and agreements with European allies on overflight, on basing\u201d that should be respected, NATO Secretary-General Mark Rutte has said, in implicit criticism of some allies like Spain, but also France.<br \/>While Spain restricted U.S. military activity related to the Iran war, U.S. warplanes have flown over other NATO allies\u2019 airspace and used U.S. bases in other NATO countries for war-related operations.<br \/>Trump has even threatened to <a href=\"https:\/\/apnews.com\/article\/trump-spain-iran-trade-defense-nato-spending-43e0f13e7b1c7e6ebcc4b558474aacdc\">cut trade<\/a> with Spain over its refusal to allow the use of its bases and airspace. More broadly, Spain has also <a href=\"https:\/\/apnews.com\/article\/nato-spain-trump-defense-spending-8b554694c18511a3b835e44a15042694\">disappointed its allies<\/a> by failing to commit to spend as much as they plan to do on defense.<br \/>___<br \/>Lorne Cook reported from Brussels.<br \/>Copyright 2026 The Associated Press. All rights reserved. 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In our commitment to covering our communities with innovation and excellence, we incorporate Artificial Intelligence (AI) technologies to enhance our news gathering, reporting, and presentation processes.<\/span> <a class=\"dist__Box-sc-1fnzlkn-0 dist__LinkBase-sc-1fnzlkn-9 iBLULw\" href=\"https:\/\/www.wsls.com\/station\/2024\/04\/18\/how-we-are-using-ai-at-graham-media-group\/\" aria-label=\"Read our article\">Read our article<\/a> <span>to see how we are using Artificial Intelligence.<\/span><br \/>Copyright \u00a9 2026 WSLS.com is managed by Graham Digital and published by Graham Media Group, a division of Graham Holdings.<\/p>\n<p><a href=\"https:\/\/news.google.com\/rss\/articles\/CBMiwwFBVV95cUxOd0dkYlZtdFZkY0tfMl9HZnFsSmpHdi16aDgzR2tvSHBXSDlXM2dXaUR2Zkp2S0t1VEpjV0E2OGNjdUplSkNuOUJFRm54MXd4V3pyMW54U1l6YVpYR05TRXZkcWRlVl80OGlwd1lYaGpWYXlGTnI5VFI4WVZidERzRlVUQnB4WVM3MjVJbU8xOXJuMUppUndvUDA2cmY5LU1TaUFBcF9MU3BCZmVtdlozVl9uOE15ei0yTUVRb294LXFmX28?oc=5\">source<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>Menelaos Hadjicostis And Lorne CookAssociated PressPublished:\u00a0April 24, 2026 at 5:40 AMMenelaos Hadjicostis And Lorne CookAssociated PressCopyright 2026 The Associated Press. All rights reservedSpain&#8217;s Prime Minister Pedro Sanchez arrives for the EU Summit in Nicosia, Cyprus, Friday, April 24, 2026. (AP Photo\/Petros Karadjias)NICOSIA \u2013 Spanish Prime Minister Pedro S\u00e1nchez on Friday refused to be drawn into [&hellip;]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":11471,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[3],"tags":[],"class_list":{"0":"post-11470","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-world"},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/globalnewstoday.uk\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/11470","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/globalnewstoday.uk\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/globalnewstoday.uk\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/globalnewstoday.uk\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/globalnewstoday.uk\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=11470"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/globalnewstoday.uk\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/11470\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/globalnewstoday.uk\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/11471"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/globalnewstoday.uk\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=11470"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/globalnewstoday.uk\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=11470"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/globalnewstoday.uk\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=11470"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}