NATO Secretary General has reassured alliance members alarmed by statements from the next President of the United States that NATO was becoming obsolete.
"NATO is important for the stability in Europe, but stability in Europe is also important for the United States," Jens Stoltenberg said in a speech to a think-tank in Brussels on Thursday.
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"And I'm absolutely certain that Donald Trump, President-elect Donald Trump, will therefore maintain a strong US commitment to NATO."
During his election campaign, Trump questioned whether the United States would automatically defend its NATO allies if they were attacked.
"Either they pay up, including for past deficiencies, or we're going to get out," said Trump at a campaign event in Wisconsin in April.
"And if it breaks up NATO, it breaks up NATO", he said.
Trump and Stoltenberg spoke by telephone for the first time last Friday and agreed to look at NATO funding, Trump's main concern.
The military alliance includes United Kingdom, Canada, Belgium and Turkey amongst others.
"The Secretary-General said that when Britain leaves the European Union, 80 percent of NATO's budget will actually be provided by countries outside Europe," said Al Jazeera's David Chater, reporting from the NATO headquarters in Brussels.
"These are matters which defence analysts are saying need to be examined."
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One analyst said that Trump's foreign policy advisors who are going to shape the new administration's relationship with NATO, not the president himself due to his limited foreign policy experience.
"This is a President-elect who comes to it without a lot of background on foreign policy," Ian Lesser, senior director of foreign policy at the German Marshall Fund, told Al Jazeera.
"It does matter a lot who is appointed in the cabinet positions, the advisors who will shape these foreign policies."
