Folks stroll alongside a road in downtown of Nuuk, Greenland, on Tuesday, Jan. 13, 2026.
Evgeniy Maloletka/AP
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Evgeniy Maloletka/AP
NUUK, Greenland — Alongside the slim, snow-covered most important road in Greenland’s capital, worldwide journalists and digicam crews cease passersby each few meters (ft) asking them for his or her ideas on a disaster which Denmark’s prime minister has warned might probably set off the tip of NATO.
Greenland is on the heart of a geopolitical storm as U.S. President Donald Trump is insisting he desires to personal the island — and the residents of its capital Nuuk say it’s not on the market. Trump stated he desires to regulate Greenland at any price and the White Home has not dominated out taking the island by pressure.
U.S. Vice President JD Vance will meet Denmark’s overseas minister Lars Løkke Rasmussen and his Greenlandic counterpart Vivian Motzfeldt in Washington on Wednesday to debate the Arctic island, which is a semiautonomous territory of the USA’ NATO ally Denmark.
Tuuta Mikaelsen, a 22-year-old scholar, instructed The Related Press in Nuuk that she hoped American officers would get the message to “back off.”
Greenland’s Prime Minister Jens-Frederik Nielsen instructed a information convention within the Danish capital Copenhagen on Tuesday that, “if we have to choose between the United States and Denmark here and now, we choose Denmark. We choose NATO. We choose the Kingdom of Denmark. We choose the EU.”
Greenland is strategically necessary as a result of as local weather change causes the ice to soften, it opens up the opportunity of shorter commerce routes to Asia. That additionally might make it simpler to extract and transport untapped deposits of crucial minerals that are wanted for computer systems and telephones.
Trump additionally stated he desires the island to broaden America’s safety and has cited what he says is the risk from Russian and Chinese language ships as a purpose to regulate it.
However each consultants and Greenlanders query that declare.
“The only Chinese I see is when I go to the fast food market,” Lars Vintner, a heating engineer instructed AP. He stated he ceaselessly goes crusing and looking and has by no means seen Russian or Chinese language ships.
His good friend, Hans Nørgaard, agreed, including “what has come out of the mouth of Donald Trump about all these ships is just fantasy.”
Denmark has stated the U.S. — which already has a navy presence — can increase its bases on Greenland. For that purpose, “security is just a cover,” Vintner stated, suggesting Trump truly desires to personal the island to earn money from its untapped pure sources.
Nørgaard instructed AP he filed a police criticism in Nuuk towards Trump’s “aggressive” conduct as a result of, he stated, American officers are threatening the individuals of Greenland and NATO. He advised Trump was utilizing the ships as a pretext to additional American enlargement.
“Donald Trump would like to have Greenland, (Russian President Vladimir) Putin would like Ukraine and (Chinese President) Xi Jinping would like to have Taiwan,” Nørgaard stated.
Mikaelsen, the scholar, stated Greenlanders profit from being a part of Denmark which supplies free well being care, training and funds throughout examine.
“I don’t want the U.S. to take that away from us,” she stated.
Forward of Wednesday’s assembly, Naaja Nathanielsen, Greenland’s minister for enterprise and mineral sources stated it is “unfathomable” that the USA is discussing taking up a NATO ally and urged the Trump administration to take heed to voices from the Arctic island’s individuals.
