The US vice-president, JD Vance, and his wife Usha are due to touch down in Greenland on Friday in a drastically scaled down trip after the original plans for the unsolicited visit prompted an international diplomatic row.
The visit to Pituffik, a remote ice-locked US military base in northwestern Greenland, will be closely watched by leaders in Nuuk and Copenhagen, who have aired their opposition to the trip amid ongoing threats by Donald Trump to acquire Greenland, a semi-autonomous territory of Denmark.
“It’s safe to say we would rather not have him [Vance] in Greenland,” a government source in Copenhagen said.
Before the Vances’ arrival, Trump said the US will “go as far as we have to go” to gain control of the island which he claimed the US “needs” for national and international security.
The mood in Copenhagen was understood to be apprehensive. On Thursday, the Danish prime minister, Mette Frederiksen, responded to Trump’s comments, saying: “Greenland is part of the Danish kingdom. That is not going to change.”
She added: “We in the kingdom would really like to work together with the Americans on defence and security. We want that in Ukraine, we want that in Europe, and of course we also want that when it comes to the high north. But Greenland belongs to the Greenlanders.”
Meanwhile Lars Løkke Rasmussen, Denmark’s minister for foreign affairs, said Vance would not be greeted by Danish politicians at Pituffik because “it has nothing to do with us”.
“This is about an American vice-president who is going to visit his own military installation in Greenland. It has nothing to do with us,” he said.
The Vance visit comes as political parties in Greenland are about to sign a coalition agreement in Nuuk on Friday in a show of unity after elections earlier this month. Greenlandic media reported four of the five parties in parliament – all except Naleraq – will go into a coalition led by Jens Frederik Nielsen of the Democrats who won 30% of the vote.
The delegation, originally to be led by the second lady, Usha Vance, was scheduled to visit the capital Nuuk and Sisimiut, for a dog sled race. Bulletproof cars had already been delivered to Nuuk in preparation.
But after strong comments from Múte B Egede, the prime minister of Greenland, and Frederiksen, the White House switched to a single stop at Pituffik.
Announcing he would be joining his wife on the trip to Greenland, the vice-president said in a video: “Speaking for President Trump, we want to reinvigorate the security of the people of Greenland because we think it’s important to protect the security of the entire world.”
The White House has shared few details of what is planned, but it is expected to be a “traditional” troop visit.
The Danish defence minister, Troels Lund Poulsen, said that Trump’s statements were “far out” and “a hidden threat”.
“It is not fair for the American president to use that rhetoric,” he told Danish broadcaster TV2. “You are going too far both in terms of interfering in internal affairs in Greenland and not least in the lack of respect for the fact that it is the people of Greenland who determine Greenland’s future.”
Pele Broberg, the Naleraq leader, which came second in the election but left coalition negotiations earlier this week, said the diplomatic disagreements over the US visit were a missed opportunity.
“I consider this an extreme example of failed diplomacy by Greenlandic politicians,” he said. “I don’t think anybody is doubting that this is a missed opportunity.”
Meanwhile in Russia, Vladimir Putin told an Arctic forum in Murmansk on Thursday that he considered US plans to acquire Greenland as “serious”. “We are talking about serious plans on the American side with regard to Greenland,” he said. “These plans have longstanding historical roots.”
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