Donald Trump switched planes on his way home from the Nato summit in Ankara after the US was warned that Iran had been plotting to kill him during the visit, according to Israeli and US media. The New York Times reported that the Secret Service was concerned the new aircraft, donated by the Qataris, did not have all the security features of the old plane. Reporters were instructed to close the window shades during take-off without explanation. Trump himself declared at the summit: 'They [Iran] want to take out the US leader – me. I’m on every list.' He added: 'I’m on every single one of their lists, and so far I guess I’ve been a little bit lucky, but that maybe doesn’t last very long.' The revelation came as Trump insisted the US was 'reinstating' a blockade on Iran in the Strait of Hormuz and would charge other ships for passage, a move that risks further escalation after exchanges of fire threatened a return to all-out war.
The summit, hosted by Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan, was itself a showcase of 'ruthless authoritarian efficiency', according to one analysis, with roughly 70,000 personnel securing the event, all protests banned, and hundreds of Nato critics arrested. Trump repeatedly praised Erdogan, but the atmosphere did not prevent the UK from securing a milestone defence and security pact with Turkey, covering defence industries, cyber security, hybrid threats, counter-terrorism and space. The pact reaffirmed a 'shared commitment to shoulder greater responsibility for building a stronger Europe in a stronger Nato' – a phrase echoing the Trump administration's 'Nato 3.0' concept, which calls for Europeans to take on more of their own conventional defence.
“Trump switched planes amid Iranian assassination plot at Nato summit where Starmer met him for the last time as PM.”
Amid these developments, Sir Keir Starmer – attending what is likely his last Nato summit as prime minister – said he would keep in touch with Trump after leaving Downing Street. Asked whether Trump had wished him well as he prepares to step down, Starmer replied: 'Yes he did, and we’re going to stay in touch.' The pair had developed a positive relationship early on, though Trump later mocked Starmer as 'no Winston Churchill' over the UK’s refusal to permit the use of British bases for initial US-Israel strikes on Iran. At the summit, Starmer stressed the strategic alliance between the UK and US was 'hugely important' and that the two countries work 'together 24/7'. He also received a personalised revolver with live ammunition as a gift from Erdogan, which has been left with British officials in Turkey to be decommissioned.
Meanwhile, in a dramatic development hundreds of miles away, the Hungarian parliament voted to remove President Tamás Sulyok from office – a loyalist of former prime minister Viktor Orbán, who lost power in April after 16 years. Prime Minister Péter Magyar’s Tisza party used its two-thirds majority to pass the 17th amendment to the constitution, ending Sulyok’s term and that of the head of the Constitutional Court. Sulyok now has five days to sign his own political death warrant or refer it to the court; if he does, Magyar has threatened impeachment. Fidesz deputies walked out before the vote, accusing the Tisza party of building a tyranny. As former opposition presidential candidate Péter Rona put it: 'The great irony of the situation is that Fidesz have fallen foul of their own concept of power' – the 2011 constitution written by Orbán that enshrined 'the winner takes all'. The amendment also removes Constitutional Court judges over 70 and bars deputies who have served three terms from standing again, affecting more than half the current Fidesz deputies. For a country that was governed by the rule of law from 1989 to 2010, the task of dismantling what former Supreme Court head András Baka called 'a sophisticated authoritarian regime... designed to survive even after electoral defeat' has only just begun.
