PRAGUE, July 2. /TASS/. Czech Prime Minister Andrej Babis has hit back at Washington's criticism of Prague over its failure to meet NATO commitments on higher defense spending, the Seznam news website reported.

"The United States must not lecture the Czech Republic. We aren’t its colony. We are its partner," the media outlet quoted the premier’s response to a request from Jan Lipavsky, the Czech Republic’s former foreign minister and now a lower house lawmaker representing the opposition Civic Democratic Party.

"I am the sovereign Czech prime minister. I have met with [US President Donald] Trump five times," Babis noted. He pointed out that he had repeatedly met the US halfway on other issues, particularly citing the Czech Republic’s recent decision to accept a suspected Ebola patient, a US national, for treatment

The Denik N news website reported earlier that the US administration had sent a note to Czech diplomats urging Prague to honor its NATO commitments on higher defense spending instead of explaining why it could not do so. According to Czech media outlets, the country’s delegation plans to address these problems at the upcoming NATO summit in Ankara.

The media point out that the Czech Republic has been unable to meet its NATO commitment to raise expenditures to two percent of GDP. The US is now pressing allies to increase the level to five percent over the coming decade.

Meanwhile, Babis said that the Czech government intended to pledge at the NATO summit that it would make every effort to bring defense spending to two percent of GDP before the end of the year.