Denmark’s leader warns Trump attack on Greenland would be the end of NATO

Denmark’s Prime Minister has declared that US President Donald Trump “should be taken seriously when he says he wants Greenland,” a day after Mr Trump repeated his threats — following the US military raid on Venezuela — to also take the semiautonomous Danish territory.

Prime Minister Mette Frederiksen of Denmark made her comments in an interview with DR, the Danish broadcaster, calling his threats “unacceptable pressure.”

“If the United States were to choose to attack another NATO country, then everything would come to an end,” she said in another interview, with Live News, a Danish news channel, adding, “The international community as we know it, democratic rules of the game, NATO, the world’s strongest defensive alliance — all of that would collapse if one NATO country chose to attack another.”

Ms Frederiksen’s warnings came a day after she put out a statement directly urging Mr Trump to “stop the threats” to take over Greenland, which he made in the fragile hours after the US raid on Venezuela. Prime Minister Jens-Frederik Nielsen of Greenland also rejected Trump’s comments, writing on social media that his rhetoric was “utterly unacceptable.”

The escalation followed a wide-spread backing for Greenland from other European powers, including UK Prime Minister Keir Starmer, who expressed his support for Ms Frederkisen’s comments.

“I stand with her, and she’s right about the future of Greenland,” he told Sky News, adding that Greenland’s future was for Denmark and Greenland to decide.

Mr Nielsen and Ms Frederiksen spoke after Mr Trump repeated his desire to control the island in an interview with The Atlantic magazine.

But hours after their joint condemnations, Mr Trump doubled down. “We need Greenland from the standpoint of national security,” he told reporters on Air Force One, adding that he thought Denmark was not doing enough to safeguard the vast mineral-rich territory.

“You know what Denmark did recently to boost up security on Greenland?” he joked. “They added one more dog sled.”

Ms Frederiksen, on Monday night, took that joke very seriously: Denmark has made investing in its Arctic defence a major focus of the past year.

“That is not factually correct,” she said in a third interview, on TV2, another Danish channel, adding, “If the American President means what he says, then the situation is as serious as I believe most people understand it to be.”

“I believe he means it seriously,” she added. “He wants Greenland. This is a conflict — we agree on that.”

In her statement Sunday, Ms Frederiksen made it clear that she thought Mr Trump was out of line. She noted that Denmark was a member of NATO and that a defence agreement with the United States already gave Washington “wide access to Greenland.”

NATO was cited by a number of European leaders in their strident defences of Denmark and Greenland’s sovereignty and territorial integrity.

German Foreign Minister Johann Wadephul made the point that “Greenland would, in principle, also be subject to NATO defence”.

France also joined in with its Foreign Ministry spokesman Pascal Confavreux telling French television that “Greenland belongs to the Greenlanders and the Danes, and it is up to them to decide what to do with it. Borders cannot be changed by force.”

The European Commission, the European Union’s executive branch, downplayed comparisons between Trump’s designs on Venezuela and Greenland.

“Greenland is an ally to the US and is also covered by the NATO alliance and that is a big big difference,” said Paula Pinho, the commission’s chief spokesperson. “We therefore completely stand by Greenland and in no ways do we see a possible comparison with what happened.”

This article originally appeared in The New York Times.

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