German Chancellor Scholz rejects Trump's call for 5 pct defense spending

BERLIN, Jan. 9 (Xinhua) -- German Chancellor Olaf Scholz on Thursday pushed back against a proposal by U.S. President-elect Donald Trump that NATO member states should increase their defense spending to 5 percent of their economic output.

Scholz made the remarks during an interview with Focus online.

He noted that a 5-percent spending target would translate to roughly 200 billion euros (206 billion U.S. d