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Denmark’s prime minister Mette Frederiksen will go to Greenland subsequent week and meet the island’s newly appointed chief Jens-Frederik Nielsen after US vice-president JD Vance claimed Denmark was neglecting the autonomous territory.
Danish officers on Saturday pushed again in opposition to the US criticism, saying America had uncared for Greenland’s safety by considerably scaling again its navy presence within the Arctic.
Lars Løkke Rasmussen, Denmark’s international minister, responded to the US vice-president’s uninvited go to to an American navy base in Greenland on Friday by saying Copenhagen was “open to criticism” however “we don’t recognize the tone during which it’s being delivered — this isn’t the way you converse to your shut allies”.
He added: “In 1945, the US had 17 bases and navy installations in Greenland with 1000’s of troopers. At present, just one American base is left . . . and one thing like 200 troopers. We are able to do extra, way more, throughout the framework we have now immediately . . . Allow us to do it collectively.”
Donald Trump’s public want to take over Greenland from Denmark has positioned the way forward for the Arctic island and its 57,000 folks in the geopolitical highlight.
Vance, along with US nationwide safety adviser Mike Waltz and power secretary Chris Wright, visited the Pituffik House Base and accused Denmark of not doing “a superb job by the folks of Greenland”.
Greenland is a semi-autonomous territory within the kingdom of Denmark however a majority of its inhabitants finally need independence from Copenhagen.
Danish officers, who unveiled a $2bn defence package deal after conceding that they’d not invested sufficient within the island’s safety, initially took a cautious strategy to Trump’s expansionist claims. However prior to now week they’ve grown extra assertive.
Rasmussen stated Vance had additionally admitted that the US had not invested sufficient within the Arctic. “The actual fact is, all of us have been harvesting the peace dividend. All of us acted on the idea that the Arctic was and needs to be a low-tension space. However that point is over. Established order shouldn’t be an possibility,” he stated.
Trump has argued that the US has fallen behind Russia and China in areas equivalent to icebreakers as its two greatest geopolitical rivals gear up for a melting of the ice within the far north.
However Danish and Greenlandic officers have been horrified by his rhetoric that “we have now to have” Greenland, refusing to rule out navy drive.
On Friday Vance stated that he didn’t suppose “navy drive is ever going to be needed”, partially as a result of he anticipated Greenlanders to decide on independence from Denmark and thereafter a more in-depth partnership with the US. The vice-president added that there have been threats from China and Russia to Greenland, however consultants stated the only public risk had come from the US.
Denmark has despatched troops to struggle alongside US troopers in Afghanistan and Iraq and its officers have been dismayed by the criticism from their closest safety ally. However they have been additionally relieved that Vance didn’t escalate issues. “I believed it will have been worse,” one stated.
Frederiksen stated that Vance’s criticism was not “a good solution to confer with Denmark”, which she known as “a superb and robust ally” to the US.
Underneath a wide-ranging defence settlement from 1951, the US is allowed to arrange navy bases throughout Greenland so long as it doesn’t impinge on Denmark’s sovereignty.
Greenlandic and Danish officers stated that they’d proposed a number of instances in recent times for the US to extend its navy footprint however America has as a substitute scaled again its presence.
Greenland unveiled a brand new, broad authorities coalition on Friday. Nielsen has criticised Vance for a scarcity of respect by asserting his uninvited go to whereas the federal government formation talks have been nonetheless happening. A lot of Danish ministers have stated they’ll quickly go to, now {that a} new authorities has been fashioned.
