Trump’s son visits Greenland. The politicians there are angry

Two weeks after future US President Donald Trump’s statements about a possible annexation of Greenland to the USA, his son Donald Trump Jr. traveled to the resource-rich autonomous Danish territory for a visit. He landed at the airport in the capital Nuuk in the morning with a Boeing 757 marked with the name “Trump”, as could be seen in videos from the airport.

The country looks at the visit with suspicion. In December, Trump again floated the idea of ​​Greenland becoming part of the United States. For “reasons of national security and freedom in the world,” the US believes “that ownership and control of Greenland is an absolute necessity,” he explained.

“Greenland belongs to the Greenlanders,” replied Danish Prime Minister Frederiksen, she told TV2, emphasizing that the territory was “not for sale.” At the same time, Frederiksen emphasized the important partnership with the USA. The United States is Denmark’s “closest ally.”

Greenland’s Prime Minister Mute Egede had already rejected Trump’s requests in December. “Greenland belongs to us. We are not for sale and will never be for sale. We must not lose our long fight for freedom,” he emphasized.

The Greenlandic politician Aaja Chemnitz responded to Trump’s purchase offer with a decisive “No, thank you.” “It’s unbelievable that some people can be so naive as to believe that our happiness lies in our becoming American citizens,” she wrote on the online network Facebook. In any case, she refuses to be “part of Trump’s wet dreams of expanding his empire into our country.”

Donald Trump first said he wanted to buy Greenland in 2019, during his first term as president. Even then, Greenland and Denmark immediately refused. Later, Trump upped the ante again. After his son landed on Tuesday, he wrote on Truth Social that the island needed “security, protection, strength and peace.” “This is a deal that has to happen.”

A day before his son’s visit to Greenland, the US president-elect said the people there would “benefit enormously from it becoming part of our nation. We will protect and honor it from a very vicious outside world.” Based on his slogan “Make America Great Again,” he demanded: “Make Greenland Great Again.”

While his father continued to cause displeasure with these statements, Donald Trump Jr. was anxious to smooth things over. He was not there to “buy Greenland,” he wrote on the online platform Rumble. “I’ll talk to people. I’m just going there as a tourist.”

According to Greenlandic media, Trump Jr. only wanted to stay on the island for a few hours. In addition, no official meetings are planned.

The Trump son’s trip “probably only serves, as Trump Jr. himself said, to create video content,” said Greenland expert Ulrik Pram Gad from the Danish Institute for International Studies. However, the way Trump speaks about international relations is “worrying”.

According to the political scientist, things could get “even worse” if Trump starts “grabbing for land.” Most Greenlanders support their prime minister on this issue, saying that Greenland is “not for sale, but open for business.”

Greenland was colonized by Denmark in the 18th century and has had autonomous status since 1979. Only around 56,000 people live on the island, which is around two million square kilometers in size and mostly covered by ice, mostly from the Inuit ethnic group.

The territory is rich in natural resources. These include oil, gas, gold, diamonds, uranium, zinc and lead. But the island’s strategic location in the Arctic, where there is already a US military base, is also likely to play a role in Trump’s considerations.

In 2023, Greenland drew up a draft constitution in the event of independence from Denmark, a step towards a possible easing of its relationship with the kingdom.