“President Trump says that the United States is getting Greenland. Let me be clear: the United States won’t get that. We do not belong to anyone else. We determine our own future,” Nielsen said, The Guardian reported.
During an interview with NBC on Saturday, the US president said: “We’ll get Greenland. Yeah, 100%,” and argued that while there’s a “good possibility that we could do it without military force… I don’t take anything off the table.”
Trump said he “absolutely” had had real conversations about annexing the semi-autonomous Danish territory.
Nielsen, a 33-year-old former minister of industry and minerals, was sworn in as Greenland’s youngest prime minister on Friday. In his first press conference as leader, in his home town of Nuuk, he called for political unity to combat external pressures. His message was clear: “At a time when we as a people are under pressure, we must stand together.”
He was sworn in a few hours before a high-profile delegation led by the US vice-president, JD Vance, arrived on the island. Vance said, “Our message to Denmark is very simple: you have not done a good job by the people of Greenland. You have underinvested in the people of Greenland and you have underinvested in the security architecture of this incredible, beautiful landmass.”
The Danish foreign minister, Lars Lokke Rasmussen, said on Saturday, “We are open to criticisms, but let me be completely honest, we do not appreciate the tone in which it’s being delivered.”
“This is not how you speak to your close allies, and I still consider Denmark and the United States to be close allies,” he said.