The autonomous Danish Arctic island has announced it's "not for sale"

Greenland has rejected any idea of selling out to Washington after US President-elect Donald Trump said control over the Arctic island would be in his country's strategic and national interest.

The autonomous territory of Denmark is sparsely inhabited and mostly covered by snow and ice. Trump has raised the issue of buying the island in his first term at the White House.

"Greenland is ours," the island's prime minister Mute Egede said in a statement quoted by AFP on Monday. "We are not for sale and will never be for sale. We must not lose our long struggle for freedom."

Announcing the nomination of the new US ambassador to Denmark on Sunday, Trump said that "ownership and control of Greenland is an absolute necessity" for the US, "for purposes of national security and freedom throughout the world."

Trump did not specifically mention an offer to buy Greenland and it was unclear whether his phrasing implied the willingness of his incoming government to seize the island by force from Denmark, a fellow NATO member.

In August 2019, one of Trump's aides confirmed that the then-president wanted to "take a look at a potential Greenland purchase," describing it as "a strategic place" with a lot of valuable minerals.

The island sits on top of several strategic trade routes in the Arctic Ocean, as well as significant deposits of uranium and precious metals. Control over the island would also allow the US to claim around 900,000 square kilometers of the adjacent continental shelf.

Though Greenland is over 2.1 million square kilometers in size, it has only around 55,000 residents, almost 90% of them Inuit. Greenland has been recognized as Danish territory since the 1814 Treaty of Kiel. It was administered as a colony until 1953 and has enjoyed home rule since 1979. Since 2009, the island has also had a parliament and a government managing internal affairs, law enforcement, and coast guard duties. Greenland has two deputies in the Danish parliament and relies on Copenhagen for its security, foreign and monetary policy, and more than half its budget.

The island formally left the EU's economic precursor in 1985 due to a dispute over fishing rights, but remains tied to the bloc as part of Denmark.

Greenland has no borders with the US, but it does with Canada. The talk about Greenland (In Greenlandic: Kalaallit Nunaat, pronounced [kalaːɬːit nʉnaːt]) becoming a part of the US could be a warning to Canada as well.

DIIS, which prepares researches for Denmark's government and parliament, said that Washington remains a key ally to Copenhagen, but acknowledged that it's not always easy to work with the Americans.

"The US is unpredictable and, as experience shows, isn't too sensitive towards the national and local priorities and interests of the host countries."
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The think tank advised Denmark and other northern nations - Iceland, Finland and Norway - to carefully monitor not only the regional activities of Russia and China, but the US as well, the think tank said.

It's paramount for Denmark to boost its own potential in the Arctic in order to lower the dependence on the US and NATO, DIIS researches said in the report. They also suggested that the government develops a set of principles that would influence American drills and other military moves on the Danish territory more actively.

• Snow joke? US govt is apparently serious about buying Greenland off Denmark (Aug 2019)
• Report says Trump in real estate mode, toying with idea of 'buying' Greenland, internet loses its mind (Aug 2019)

• Fireball above US base in Greenland puzzles NASA scientist - jokes about 'Russian strike' (Aug 2018)
• Nukes at the bottom of the sea? (Jul 2018)
• Will Greenland join the family of independent nations? (May 2018)
• Defense Secretary: U.S. needs to upgrade radar system to detect Russian missiles (Sep 2015)
• US Army's top secret Arctic city under the ice 'Camp Century' (Feb 2015) See also from Nov 2024: NASA discovers abandoned US military installation under Greenland ice sheet
• No descendants are left from the first Eskimos (Aug 2014)
• Rush for iron spurred Inuit ancestors to sprint across Arctic, book contends (Feb 2010)
• Danish secret UFO archives opened (Jan 2009)

The Air Force said that most of the sightings remained 'unidentified' because the details were not precise enough. However, some of the reports contained enough description to rule out the UFOs as aircraft, weather phenomenon or paper lanterns. Not all of the sightings were centred over Denmark and one event over Greenland is attracting attention.

On the 5 January, 1981 at 12:50 a flaming, square disc was seen approximately 45 degrees over the frozen land near Thule Air Base. It then vanished as suddenly as it had appeared.

Coincidentally, radar stations at the American base recorded an unidentified flying object on its radar at 12:50.

The stances taken by EU and NATO nations on handling the Ukraine conflict have changed since Donald Trump won the US presidential elections in November, according to Representative Mike Waltz.

The President-elect has made it clear the war must end. Waltz also emphasized that part of his role, along with Trump's team, is to identify key players in peace negotiations, to bring them to the table, and to establish terms for a resolution that align with American interests.

Waltz criticized the administration of outgoing President Joe Biden, saying it wanted more funding of its Ukraine policy, but declined to define the specific outcome that pouring hundreds of billions of dollars into the conflict should produce. He also said he has been receiving questions from his constituents about that. He quoted the inquiries:

"Is it in America's national interest to expect every Russian off of every inch of Ukraine, including Crimea? How long is that going to take? How much money is that going to cost? How many lives will be lost? Is that even a realistic goal at this point?"

Waltz claimed that Russia was seriously weakened by the fight against its NATO-backed embattled neighbour, giving Trump leverage on both Kiev and Moscow.

Russian President Vladimir Putin stated last week that his nation's military is in a very good shape, supported by a reinvigorated defense industry and military technology that the West cannot match.