Danish Prime Minister Mette Frederiksen is in Greenland for a three-day trip aimed at building trust and cooperation with Greenlandic officials at a time when the Trump administration is seeking control of the vast Arctic territory.
Frederiksen announced plans for her visit after US Vice President JD Vance visited a US air base in Greenland last week and accused Denmark of underinvesting in the territory.
Greenland is a mineral-rich, strategically critical island that is becoming more accessible because of climate change. Trump has said that the landmass is critical to US security. It’s geographically part of North America, but is a semiautonomous territory belonging to the Kingdom of Denmark.
After her arrival Wednesday, Frederiksen walked the streets of the capital, Nuuk, with the incoming Greenlandic leader, Jens-Frederik Nielsen. She is also to meet with the future Naalakkersuisut, the Cabinet, in a visit due to last through Friday.
“It has my deepest respect how the Greenlandic people and the Greenlandic politicians handle the great pressure that is on Greenland,” she said in government statement announcing the visit.
On the agenda are talks with Nielsen about cooperation between Greenland and Denmark.
Nielsen has said in recent days that he welcomes the visit, and that Greenland would resist any US attempt to annex the territory.
“We must listen when others talk about us. But we must not be shaken. President Trump says the United States is ‘getting Greenland.’ Let me make this clear: The U.S. is not getting that. We don’t belong to anyone else. We decide our own future,” he wrote Sunday on Facebook.
“We must not act out of fear. We must respond with peace, dignity and unity. And it is through these values that we must clearly, clearly and calmly show the American president that Greenland is ours.”
For years, the people of Greenland, with a population of about 57,000, have been working toward eventual independence from Denmark.
The Trump administration’s threats to take control of the island one way or the other, possibly even with military force, have angered many in Greenland and Denmark. The incoming government chosen in last month’s election wants to take a slower approach on the question of eventual independence.
The political group in Greenland most sympathetic to the US president, the Naleraq party that advocates a swift path toward independence, was excluded from coalition talks to form the next government.
Peter Viggo Jakobsen, associate professor at the Danish Defense Academy, said last week that the Trump administration’s aspirations for Greenland could backfire and push the more mild parties closer to Denmark.
He said that “Trump has scared most Greenlanders away from this idea about a close relationship to the United States because they don’t trust him.”