Greenland’s prime minister’s response to Trump

The Prime Minister of Greenland intends to resist Donald Trump’s territorial conquest project. For weeks, the president-elect of the United States has been threatening the annexation of Greenland, an Arctic island with 56,000 inhabitants and considerable wealth. Múte B. Egede reiterated that this was out of the question, during a press conference alongside his Danish counterpart, Mette Frederiksen, this Friday.

“Greenland belongs to the Greenlanders. We don’t want to be Danes, we don’t want to be Americans, we want to be Greenlanders. he said. The island is a semi-autonomous territory attached to the Kingdom of Denmark. Its head of state is King Frederik X.

At the beginning of January, Donald Trump declared that he would not rule out using force or economic pressure to make Greenland part of the United States. From his first mandate, in 2019, he expressed his desire to get his hands on the immense Arctic island, offering to buy it from Denmark. Beyond opening new maritime routes to the Americans, Greenland has subsoils containing 43 of the 50 rare earths necessary for green technologies, such as wind turbines or electric cars.

“Cooperation is based on dialogue”

The meeting between Frederiksen and Egede this Friday was not initially intended to discuss these annexation threats. They met as part of a biannual assembly of Denmark with the two other territories of its kingdom, Greenland and the Faroe Islands. The matter was raised in questions from journalists during the press conference following the meeting.

The Greenlandic Prime Minister has not yet spoken to Donald Trump, but he says he is ready to discuss “what unites them”. “Cooperation is based on dialogue. Cooperation means working to find solutions”he stressed. He had already expressed his opposition to the idea of ​​annexation last Monday, December 23, after a publication by Donald Trump on X. “Greenland belongs to us. We are not for sale and we will never be for sale. he then assured.

For her part, the Danish Prime Minister does not want to offend the American president. “The debate on Greenland’s independence and the latest announcements from the United States show us the great interest in Greenland,” she declared during the press conference. Before continuing: “The United States is our closest ally and we will do everything to continue strong cooperation.”