The American President Donald Trump has not forgotten Greenland. This emerged from a press conference on Monday evening, where he repeated his desire to take over Greenland.
The press conference was otherwise about the war against Iran, but towards the end Trump began to criticize NATO for not helping the US, after which he said: “It all started with Greenland, if you want to hear the truth. We want Greenland. They won’t give it to us, and I said goodbye”.
The American President Donald Trump has not forgotten Greenland. This emerged from a press conference on Monday evening, where he repeated his desire to take over Greenland.
The press conference was otherwise about the war against Iran, but towards the end Trump began to criticize NATO for not helping the US, after which he said: “It all started with Greenland, if you want to hear the truth. We want Greenland. They won’t give it to us, and I said goodbye”.
Trump left the press conference immediately afterwards, and has not elaborated on his message since.
Declaration of bankruptcy
Subsequently, the newly elected Member of Parliament for Inuit Ataqatigiit, Naaja H. Nathanielsen, commented on the president’s announcements on Facebook:
– Unfortunately, we live in a time where we have to state again and again that we are a people, a culture and a country with the right to self-determination. We control the direction of the sled. In these years, powerful forces are copying a rhetoric that belongs to the past. You can see it seeping around in society, so that it no longer only belongs to the fringes. It must be spoken against and not silenced. Greenland is a democracy. We recognize international law. And it is not up to other countries to define our present or future. Threatening superiority is not winning. It is a declaration of bankruptcy, wrote Naaja H. Nathanielsen.
An expression of frustration
Senior researcher at the Danish Institute for International Studies (DIIS), Rasmus Sinding Søndergaard, sees Trump’s comment at the end of the press conference as an expression that he is still frustrated that Greenland and Denmark have not let him take over Greenland, and that several NATO countries have backed Greenland’s right to self-determination.
– The comment came as a follow-up to Trump expressing his dissatisfaction with NATO. So I see it as an expression that he thinks NATO has been a bad ally. NATO does not support the war in Iran, and the gravest sin was that they did not want to give Trump Greenland either. Trump is clearly still frustrated that Greenland and Denmark did not agree that he should take over Greenland and that several NATO countries supported this.
Expansion of territory
According to Rasmus Sinding Søndergaard, it is now very clear that Trump wants Greenland to expand the American territory.
– Trump is not interested in military bases or minerals. He is interested in expanding the territory of the United States and it has not worked with the tactics he has put forward, which frustrates him.
However, Rasmus Sinding Søndergaard does not think that one should put too much into Trump’s comment at this time.
– From the Danish and Greenlandic side, there is an interest in continuing the factual negotiation track in the working group on American access to several military bases in Greenland, which takes the focus away from a takeover of Greenland.
