Greenland’s prime minister Múte Bourup Eged has responded defiantly after Donald Trump reignited discussions about the US potentially acquiring Greenland in a cryptic social media post.
The president-elect offered to buy the world’s biggest island in 2019 and even cancelled a planned trip to Denmark after PM Mette Frederiksen described the suggestion as “absurd” and said she hoped Trump was not being serious.
But it appears the idea remains fresh in his head.
Earlier this month, he posted: “For purposes of National Security and Freedom throughout the World, the United States of America feels that the ownership and control of Greenland is an absolute necessity.”
Greenland is already crucial to American national defence, being home to a US airbase and a radar station.
The war in Ukraine has dramatically increased the territory’s military value to the US and Nato, given the island’s strategic location between the Arctic and the North Atlantic.
Trump made the statement on Sunday as he nominated PayPal co-founder Ken Howery as US ambassador to the Kingdom of Denmark.
Howery responded on X saying he would work to “deepen the bonds” between the US, Denmark and Greenland. Howery was an ambassador to Sweden from 2019 to 2021, under Trump’s first administration.
Responding to Trump’s suggestions, Greenland’s PM Múte Bourup Egede said: “Greenland is ours. We are not for sale and will never be for sale. We must not lose our long struggle for freedom.”
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