BERLIN (Reuters) - Germany supports a dialogue between the United States and Russia, but Donald Trump must not ignore Russian actions in Crimea and Aleppo when he sits down with President Vladimir Putin, the German defence minister said on Friday.
Speaking at an event in Berlin, Ursula von der Leyen also said that NATO would be "dead" if any one of its members refused to come to the defence of another that was under attack.
Trump, who defeated Democrat Hillary Clinton in the U.S. presidential election this week, praised Putin repeatedly during his campaign and questioned whether the United States should defend NATO allies that were not shouldering their fair share of the financial burden in the alliance.
"It is a good thing when the new American president immediately seeks a dialogue with the Russian president. It is good and it has our full support," von der Leyen, a member of Chancellor Angela Merkel's conservatives, said.
"What can't happen is forgetting - forgetting the annexation of Crimea, forgetting the hybrid war in Ukraine which continues, forgetting the bombardment of Aleppo," she said.
Trump's election has deeply unsettled the government in Berlin, which has been the driving force behind EU sanctions against Russia for Putin's military intervention in Ukraine and has strongly condemned the bombing of civilians in the rebel-held Syrian city of Aleppo by Russian-backed forces.
Russia is hoping the united front between Europe and Washington on sanctions will crumble under Trump. On Thursday, a Kremlin spokesman described Trump and Putin's approach to foreign policy as "phenomenally close". [nL8N1DB8PK]
Von der Leyen acknowledged that Trump's victory meant Germany and Europe would likely have to take on more responsibility for their own defence.
But she said the German government was still struggling to answer the question of what a Trump presidency meant, saying "we know next to nothing."
(Reporting by Noah Barkin; editing by Mark Heinrich)
SEE ALSO: Donald Trump says protests against him are 'incited by the media,' calls them 'very unfair'
Join the conversation about this story »
NOW WATCH: Animated map shows where your bottled water actually comes from