Danish head of government travels to Greenland

After visiting Vance

Danish head of government travels to Greenland

After visiting the US Vice President, the Danish head of government wants to visit the island. Vance had previously sharply criticized her Foreign Minister.

One day after visiting US Vice President JD Vance at a US military base in Greenland, the Danish Prime Minister Mette Frederiksen announced a trip to the island. She will be in Greenland from Wednesday to Friday to strengthen the “unity” between Denmark and the Arctic island area, her office announced on Saturday.

Frederiksen was quoted in the message with the future Greenland Prime Minister Jens Frederik Nielsen to continue the “close and trusting cooperation between Greenland and Denmark”.

The Danish government had previously rejected Vance’s reservations for dealing with Greenland. “We are open to criticism, but to be honest, we do not appreciate the tone in which it was formulated,” said Foreign Minister Lars Lökke Rasmussen in a video that was released in online service X on Saturday.

“So you don’t talk to tight allies – and I still consider Denmark and the United States to be close allies,” continued the Danish chief diplomat. Frederiksen had already rejected Vance’s criticism on Friday.

Vance had a short visit to the Pituffik US military base in Greenland on Friday with his wife and national security advisor Mike Waltz. “Our message to Denmark is very simple: you have not done a good job for people in Greenland,” said the US Vice President. The Danish government had “not invested too little in the people in Greenland” and too little in the security architecture.

The Pituffik military base is a outpost of US air defense against rocket attacks, especially from Russia. The shortest distance for Russian rockets against goals in the United States leads through Greenland. Read more about this here.

US President Donald Trump had confirmed on Friday that his country would need Greenland to maintain “international security”. Previously, he had repeatedly obviously expressed his intention to bring the Arctic island area under US control.

Greenland and Denmark decide an annexation. Around 57,000 people live on the largest island in the world. Valuable raw materials are stored in the soil that have so far hardly been used. Greenland has been autonomous in many areas since 1979, but the former colonial power of Denmark still decides on foreign and defense policy.