Republican presidential nominee Donald Trump on Sunday said that France, Germany and other nations hit by terror attacks recently had only themselves to blame ”because they allowed people to come into their territory.”

Trump, who has been in favour of suspending immigration from what he calls countries "compromised by terrorism" until vetting mechanisms are in place, said, "We have problems in Germany, and we have problems in France" during an interview on NBC’s “Meet the Press”.

“They have been compromised by terrorism, they have totally been. And you know why? It’s their own fault. Because they allowed people to come into their territory,” he said.

The candidate has repeatedly called for “extreme vetting” to be put in place for such nations to protect the US from the risk of attack.

Trump denied the policy amounted to backing away from his previous call for a temporary ban on Muslim immigration.

“I actually don’t think it’s a rollback. In fact, you could say it’s an expansion. I’m looking now at territory,” he said.

“People were so upset when I used the word Muslim. Oh, you can’t use the word Muslim. Remember this. And I’m okay with that because I’m talking territory instead of Muslim,” he added.

“Just remember this, our Constitution is great. But it doesn’t necessarily give us the right to commit suicide, okay? Now, we have a religious, you know, everybody wants to be protected. And that’s great. And that’s the wonderful part of our Constitution. I view it differently,” Trump said.