Pompeo cancels Germany trip because of “pressing issues”

May 7, 2019

Secretary of State Mike Pompeo was supposed to meet with German Chancellor Angela Merkel Tuesday afternoon, but the State Department canceled the trip over “pressing issues.” His plane has left Finland, where he participated in a meeting of the Arctic Council, but the department isn’t disclosing where he’s going next.

Pompeo is slated to meet with British Prime Minister Theresa May and Foreign Secretary Jeremy Hunt in London on Wednesday, so it’s unlikely he’ll be traveling to a far-flung location.

According to the State Department pool, reporters accompanying Pompeo have been instructed that they may not be able to report the stop while on the ground in the mystery destination.

This comes after an announcement Monday that an aircraft carrier strike group and Air Force bombers would be sent to the Persian Gulf in response to “recent and clear indications that Iranian and Iranian proxy forces were making preparations to possibly attack U.S. forces in the region,” according to a Defense Department statement.

“What we’ve been trying to do is to get Iran to behave like a normal nation,” Pompeo told reporters in Finland Monday.

Pompeo is set to meet with Russian Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov in Sochi on May 14. He may also meet with Russian President Vladimir Putin that day.

Christina Ruffini contributed to this report