Attendees listen to a virtual speech delivered by U.S. president Donald Trump, at the Annual Meeting of World Economic Forum in Davos, Switzerland, Jan. 23. AP-Yonhap

U.S. President Donald Trump said Thursday that businesses around the world will have to pay tariffs if they do not make their products in the United States, as he underscored his push to make America a "manufacturing superpower."

Speaking virtually at the World Economic Forum, Trump also stressed his pursuit of "fair" trade relations with foreign countries, expressing his displeasure over "massive" deficits with China and "a lot of" other Asian countries as well as "hundreds of billions of dollars of deficits" with the European Union (EU).

The new president also said that he will ask North Atlantic Treaty Organization (NATO) member states to raise their defense spending to 5 percent of their gross domestic product (GDP) — much higher than the 2 percent guideline set in 2014 by leaders of the transatlantic alliance.

"My message to every business in the world is very simple: Come make your product in America and we will give you among the lowest taxes of any nation on Earth. We are bringing them down very substantially even from the original Trump tax cuts," he said at the forum in Switzerland via a video link.

"But if you don't make your product in America, which is your prerogative, then very simply, you will have to pay a tariff, differing amounts, but a tariff which will direct hundreds of billions of dollars and even trillions of dollars into our treasury to strengthen our economy and pay down debt."

Moreover, Trump pledged to reduce the current corporate tax rate of 21 percent to 15 percent for firms that manufacture their products in the U.S.

His remarks reaffirmed his commitment to bolstering American manufacturing and imposing tariffs to pare down the U.S.' trade deficits as part of his much-vaunted America First policy that has put U.S. trading partners, including allies like South Korea, on edge.

On Monday, his first day in office, Trump signed a memorandum on a trade policy move calling for a review of existing U.S. trade agreements to seek "reciprocal and mutually advantageous" concessions with respect to free trade partners.

Regarding China, Trump anticipated a "very good relationship" with Beijing, but stressed that he wants "fairness" and "a level playing field."

"We've been having massive deficits with China. Biden allowed it to get out of hand ... $1.1 trillion deficits, ridiculous, and it's just an unfair relationship. We have to make if fair," he said.

"The deficit is massive as it is with other countries, a lot of Asian countries. We have deficits that are very big, and we can't keep doing that."

He also expressed discomfort in trade relations with the EU.

"We have hundreds of billions of dollars of deficits with the EU, and nobody's happy about it and we are going to do something about it," he said.

He heaped further pressure on NATO members to jack up their defense spending -- a demand that South Korea has been keenly watching as the second Trump administration could also call for an increase in Seoul's share of the cost for the stationing of the 28,500-strong U.S. Forces Korea.

"I am also going to ask all NATO nations to increase defense spending to 5 percent of GDP, which is what it should have been years ago," he said. "It was only at 2 percent and most nations didn't pay."

Later at the Oval Office, Trump told reporters that he is "not sure" whether the U.S. should be spending "anything" on the NATO alliance.

"We are protecting them. They're not protecting us," he said according to a White House press corps pool report.

The president unveiled a plan to ask the Organization of the Petroleum Exporting Countries, a group of leading oil-producing nations, to cut the price of oil, arguing that should the price come down, Russia's war in Ukraine would end "immediately."

"Right now, the price is high enough that the war will continue. You got to bring down the oil price. You can end the war. They should have done it long ago," he said.

He went on to say that with oil prices going down, he will demand interest rates drop "immediately."

"And likewise, they should be dropping all over the world," he said without elaborating. "Interest rates should follow us."

U.S. President Donald Trump, right, and Russian President Vladimir Putin hold a bilateral meeting at the G20 leaders summit in Osaka, Japan, June 28, 2019. Reuters-Yonhap

He expressed his wish to meet Russian President Vladimir Putin "soon" to end the war.

"That's not from the standpoint of economy or anything else," he said. "It's from the standpoint of millions of lives (that) are being wasted ... Beautiful young people are being shot in the battlefield," he said.

Trump voiced hope that China can work together with the U.S. to end the war in Ukraine, saying Beijing has a "great deal of power over the situation."

In addition, he touched on the issue of "denuclearization" with Russia and China, apparently referring to nuclear arms control efforts with the countries.

"In fact, with President Putin prior to an election result (in 2020), we were talking about denuclearization of our two countries and China would have come along," he said.

He noted that Putin liked the idea of "cutting way back" on nuclear weapons.

"I think the rest of the world ... we would have gotten them to follow, and China would have come along too. China also liked it," he said.

He pointed out that efforts to reduce nuclear arms would have been an "unbelievable thing for the planet."

"I can tell you that President Putin wanted to do it. He and I wanted to do it," he said. "We had a good conversation with China. They would have been involved."

The president did not mention the issue of North Korea's denuclearization.

Noting his drive to boost oil and gas production under his "national energy emergency" declaration, Trump claimed that this will not only reduce the cost of virtually all goods and services, but also help make the U.S. a "manufacturing superpower" and the "world capital of artificial intelligence (AI) and crypto."

Later in the day, Trump signed an executive order to revoke certain existing AI policies and directives, which act as barriers to American AI innovation, and clear a path for the U.S. to "act decisively to retain global leadership in artificial intelligence," the White House said.

He also inked an order to launch a cryptocurrency working group under which banking services for crypto companies will be protected among other measures, according to Reuters. (Yonhap)