Trump once more insists the US ‘needs’ to take over Greenland for nationwide safety: ‘We’ll need to work all of it out’ | EUROtoday

President Trump additional pressed his case on Monday for why the U.S. needs to take management of Greenland, describing the island as important for American safety and making a weird declare that the U.S. was exploring Greenland 300 years in the past.

“We need it for national protection,” the president stated throughout a press convention in Florida, a day after he appointed a brand new U.S. envoy to the semi-autonomous Danish territory, infuriating native officers.

Trump went on to say that the U.S. wasn’t in search of to extract Greenland’s mineral wealth, however moderately that he needs to make use of the island to assist counter the affect of Russia and China, nations he accused of getting ships within the area.

“They say that Denmark was there 300 years ago or something with a boat,” Trump added. “Well, we were there with boats too, I’m sure. So we’ll have to work it all out.”

(The Inuit have lived in Greenland for hundreds of years, and Europeans made contact with the island within the late tenth century. The U.S. wouldn’t play a serious function in exploring the realm round Greenland till the late nineteenth century.)

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He additionally falsely claimed Denmark wasn’t supporting the island, regardless that in September it pledged a multi-year, $253 million funding bundle for Greenland.

Over the weekend, Trump introduced that Louisiana Governor Jeff Landry will function a particular envoy to the island territory, which the president has regularly expressed curiosity in taking management of all through his time in workplace.

The announcement, which adopted months of quiet after a flurry of stress early in Trump’s time period, prompted an offended response from officers in Greenland and Denmark.

“We have said it before. Now, we say it again: national borders and the sovereignty of states are rooted in international law,” Danish Prime Minister Mette Frederiksen and her Greenlandic counterpart, Jens-Frederik Nielsen, stated in a joint assertion. “They are fundamental principles. You cannot annex another country. Not even with an argument about international security.”

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Denmark has additionally summoned the U.S. ambassador to Copenhagen.

As not too long ago as October, the Trump administration’s curiosity in Greenland gave the impression to be dying down.

“Right now it seems far away. There is perhaps a feeling that we can breathe a sigh of relief,” Prime Minister Frederiksen stated throughout a session of the Danish parliament on the time. “It is my belief that we cannot.”

Early in his time period, Trump was placing a full-court press on Greenland.

In March, Vice President JD Vance visited a U.S. base there, the identical month the president stated he wouldn’t rule out utilizing drive to take the island.

Tensions escalated additional in May, when information reviews claimed the U.S. was intensifying spying efforts in Greenland, prompting Denmark to say it could summon the U.S. ambassador for clarification.